Opening Bell: Indices opt for a cheerful start to the weekend; Sensex opens 500 points higher lifted by IT stocks

The benchmark indices decided to make the weekend better by starting on a positive note amid positive global cues. Nifty futures on the Singapore Exchange traded 204 points or 1.23%, higher at 16,814. On the global front, Tokyo stocks opened in green on Friday, extending rallies on Wall Street eyeing the US jobs data due later in the day while the markets in China, Hong Kong, Taiwan and Thailand are closed on Friday for public holidays. On Wall Street, stocks managed to erase the weak start on Thursday and ended with S&P 500 rising 1.8%, Dow Jones Industrial Average gaining 1.3% and Nasdaq climbing 2.7%.

At the open, Sensex was up 500 points whereas Nifty topped the 16,750 level. HCL Technologies and Infosys rose 2% each. India VIX traded 4.79% lower at the 19.35 level in the initial minutes of the trading session. Out of 30, 25 stocks opened in green on Sensex. The top gainers in Sensex at the open were HCL Technologies, Wipro, Infosys, Reliance Industries and Tech Mahindra whereas the only losers were Ultratech Cement, Asian Paints, NTPC, Titan Company and Bharti Airtel.

In the broader markets, at 9.40 am BSE Mid Cap and Small Cap indices traded 0.4% and 0.76% higher, respectively. The top three midcap stocks were ISEC Heavy Engineering, Mindtree and Mphasis whereas the top three small cap stocks were Indiabulls Housing Finance, TCI Express and VA Tech Wabag.

On the sectoral front, indices traded flat with the BSE IT Index zooming more than 2%. The top stocks pulling up the IT index were RPSG Ventures, Datamatics Global Services, HCL Infosystems, Intellect Desing Arena and NIIT climbing up to 9.7%. On the other hand, shares of cement firms are likely to be in focus after UltraTech approved a capital expenditure of Rs 12,886 crore to increase its capacity.