By Bharath Rajeswaran and Vivek Kumar M
(Reuters) -India’s equity benchmarks rose on Monday, led by a post-results rally in index heavyweights private lender HDFC Bank and oil-to-telecom conglomerate Reliance Industries, while profit booking in ICICI Bank capped gains.
The Nifty 50 rose 0.45% to 25,828.75, while the BSE Sensex added 0.51% to 84,376.21 as of 10:09 a.m. IST.
Both the benchmarks rose about 0.8% each in early trade, coming within 2% of the record high levels hit on September 2024.
Fourteen of the 16 major sectors logged gains. The broader small-caps traded flat while the mid-caps rose about 0.6%.
Top private lender HDFC Bank rose as much as 1.74% to a record high after posting a higher-than-expected profit for the second quarter on steady loan growth and higher trading income.
It has pared some of the gains, trading about 0.5% higher.
Reliance Industries rose 3.4% to a three-month high, with brokerages terming the company’s core earnings, retail and improving earnings outlook as positives.
On the flipside, ICICI Bank fell 2% despite a profit beat in the September quarter, with some analysts flagging softness in loan and deposit growth, while maintaining a positive outlook.
The private lender had gained 4.1% in the previous four sessions ahead of its results on Saturday.
“Positive quarterly earnings, festive demand and optimism about the India-U.S. trade talks have supported the upward momentum in the markets, strengthening investor confidence,” said Vishnu Kant Upadhyay, assistant vice president of research and advisory at Master Capital Services.
Among other stocks, Ultratech Cement fell 0.7% after reporting results that missed most analysts’ estimates, due to higher costs.
Still, brokerages reiterated their positive outlook on the the country’s top cementmaker’s earnings in the second half of the fiscal year 2026. Ultratech had risen 2.5% in the last three sessions.
RBL Bank jumped 6% after Emirates NBD bank’s record $3 billion cross-border investment in the private lender.
(Reporting by Vivek Kumar M and Bharath Rajeswaran; Editing by Ronojoy Mazumdar)
