Mumbai, April 2 -- Staging a spirited recovery, stock markets pared early losses to close higher on Thursday, with the benchmark Sensex rising by 185 points and the broader Nifty settling above 22,700 on strong value buying in IT and banking shares and a sharp rebound in the rupee.

Rebounding more than 2,000 points from the day's low, the 30-share BSE Sensex finally settled higher by 185.23 points, or 0.25 per cent, at 73,319.55. The index opened lower and tanked further by 1,588 points to hit a day's low of 71,545.81 in the first half of the session. .

The 50-share NSE Nifty followed a similar trajectory and closed above 22,700 at 22,713.10, up by 33.70 points, or 0.15 per cent. The index fell 496.85 points, or 2.19 per cent, in early trade before recovering to hit a high of 22,782.30.

A sharp rebound in the rupee after the Reserve Bank stepped in with a slew of measures to restrict banks from onshore forward markets also helped improve investor sentiment. The rupee rebounded by 188 paise to hit the 92 level against the US dollar briefly in the day trade before settling over 150 paise higher.

At the interbank foreign exchange, the rupee opened at 94.62 and registered a sharp single-day surge of 188 paise to touch an intra-day high of 92.82 against the greenback.

At the end of the session, the rupee was quoted at 93.18 against the dollar, higher by 152 paise, or 1.6 per cent, from its previous closing level.

Bargain hunting in IT stocks supported the recovery, with HCL Technologies and Tech Mahindra ending nearly 3 per cent higher.

Infosys, Tata Consultancy Services, HDFC Bank, Bajaj Finance, Maruti Suzuki India, Titan, Axis Bank, Bharat Electronics Ltd, Kotak Mahindra Bank and ITC were the major gainers among Sensex shares.

On the other hand, Asian Paints, Eternal, Sun Pharmaceuticals, NTPC, Reliance Industries, PowerGrid, Mahindra & Mahindra, UltraTech Cement, Adani Ports, Bajaj Finserv and Tata Steel were the only laggards.

US President Donald Trump, in his first national address since the Iran war began, said that the US will continue to hit Iran very hard. The United States will "finish the job" in Iran soon as "core strategic objectives are nearing completion" and military operations could wrap up soon, Trump said in his Wednesday night speech.

Crude oil spiked more than 7 per cent after Trump's speech. Brent crude, the global oil benchmark, traded 7.28 per cent higher at $108.52 per barrel.

A total of 2,649 stocks advanced, while 1,589 declined and 149 remain unchanged on the BSE. BSE SmallCap Select Index slipped 0.36 per cent, while MidCap Select Index went lower by 0.10 per cent.

Among the sectoral indices, Focussed IT gained the most by 2.76 per cent, followed by IT (2.42 per cent), Realty (1.19 per cent), Top 10 Banks (0.46 per cent), Private Banks Index (0.40 per cent), Metal and Bankex by 0.35 per cent each, FMCG (0.27 per cent), and Financial Services (0.24 per cent). MidSmall Private Banks Quality Tilt, Oil & Gas, Consumer Durables, Hospitals, Energy, Healthcare, were among the laggards.

FIIs offloaded equities worth Rs 8,331.15 crore on Wednesday, according to exchange data. Domestic Institutional Investors (DIIs), however, bought stocks worth Rs 7,171.80 crore.

Published by HT Digital Content Services with permission from Millennium Post.