Sensex, Nifty trade at record-high, Maruti Suzuki and Wipro top gainers

Indian frontline indices were trading at a record-high on Thursday following positive global cues.

At 9.46 a.m., Sensex was up 144 points or 0.17 per cent at 85,314 and Nifty was up 36 points or 0.14 per cent at 26,040.

In early trade, Sensex and Nifty made a new all-time high of 85,372 and 26,056 respectively.

In the Sensex pack, Maruti Suzuki, Wipro, Tata Motors, Nestle, HCL Tech, Tech Mahindra, Infosys, ITC, TCS, Bajaj Finserv, HUL, Bharti Airtel, Axis Bank and SBI were the top gainers. Power Grid, NTPC, Tata Steel, JSW Steel, Titan, Bajaj Finance, HDFC Bank, L&T and Kotak Mahindra Bank were the top losers.

Selling was seen in the midcap and smallcap stocks. Nifty midcap 100 index was down 375 points or 0.62 per cent at 60,089 and Nifty smallcap 100 index was down 104 points or 0.54 per cent at 19,252.

According to market experts, "There are no immediate near-term triggers that can take the market sharply up or down. Up moves may attract selling by FIIs who are likely to move some more money to China and Hong Kong since these markets are cheap and are witnessing an uptrend now. But FII selling is unlikely to push the market down significantly since the ample domestic liquidity can easily absorb such selling."

"A range-bound market is a near-term scenario and, therefore, the real action will be stock-specific," they added.

Among the sectoral indices, PSU Bank, metal, realty, energy, pvt bank, and infra were major losers. Auto, IT, pharma, FMCG, services and healthcare were major gainers.

A bullish trend is being seen in Asian markets. Tokyo, Hong Kong, Shanghai, Jakarta and Seoul are trading in the green. The US markets closed mixed on Wednesday.

The foreign institutional investors (FIIs) extended their selling as they sold equities worth Rs 973 crore on September 25, while domestic institutional investors extended their buying as they further bought equities worth Rs 1,778 crore on the same day.