New Delhi, May 1 -- Small-cap stocks, a favourite segment among retail investors, showed remarkable resilience in April, outperforming their large- and mid-cap peers by a wide margin amid improving market sentiment, valuation comfort, and renewed earnings optimism.

The Nifty Smallcap 250 finished the first month of FY27 with a solid gain of 17.10%, outperforming both the Nifty 50 and the Nifty Midcap 150, which advanced 7.3% and 13.22%, respectively, during the same period.

It was also the gauge's best monthly performance since May 2014, when it had logged a return of 21.2%. The sharp rebound pushed the index to its highest level since January and helped it recover all of the war-driven losses.

The outperformance was largely driven by ...