BENGALURU, March 16 (Reuters) - Indian shares rose on Tuesday, supported by gains in IT stocks, while global equities advanced ahead of a slew of central bank meetings, starting with the U.S. Federal Reserve.
The NSE Nifty 50 index rose 0.51% to 15,005.85 by 0457 GMT, while the S&P BSE Sensex climbed 0.61% to 50,703.15. Both the indexes shed about 0.7% each on Monday, hurt by surging COVID-19 cases and weak economic data.
Investors in Indian equities have trimmed their positions in March due to a resurgence in domestic COVID-19 infections and rising U.S. bond yields, bringing the monthly gains so far to just about 3% against a 6.6% jump in February.
“We are now in a highly volatile phase where the market swings on a daily basis, responding to major triggers,” said V.K. Vijayakumar, chief investment strategist at Geojit Financial Services.
“Bear-hammering and short-covering are making markets excessively volatile.”
Among individual shares and sectors, index heavyweights Infosys and Tata Consultancy Services were among the top boosts to the Nifty 50, adding more than 1.5% each.
That pushed the Nifty IT index 1.34% higher — the biggest among sectoral indexes.
Asian Paints, which fell over 1% in the last two sessions, rose 2.8% and was the top percentage gainer on both the Nifty 50 and Sensex.
Bucking the trend, however, metal stocks declined 1.23%, after closing 1.04% lower in the previous session.
Tata Communications slid 6.2% after the telecommunication services provider said the government would sell up to a 10% stake in the company.
Other Asian stocks tracked an advance on Wall Street overnight, with MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan rising 0.7%.
Reporting by Chandini Monnappa in Bengaluru; editing by Uttaresh.V
Source: Reuters