MUMBAI: India’s stock market closed at a second straight record high yesterday while the rupee rallied on hopes that exit polls will show the right-wing Hindu nationalist party on track to win national elections.
Later in the day, the exit polls — surveys of voters as they leave polling stations — showed the opposition Bharatiya Janata Party, regarded as more investor-friendly than the ruling left-leaning Congress party, winning power.
The Bombay Stock Exchange’s benchmark index known as the Sensex rose 2.51 percent to hit 23,572.88 points in afternoon trade, surpassing its previous record of 23,048.49 points struck on Friday. But the Sensex trimmed its intraday gains to finish the day up 2.42 percent at 23,551.00 points — still another record closing high for the index.
The rupee strengthened to its highest against the US currency in nearly 10 months, touching 59.51 rupees to the dollar, a level last seen in July. Since the BJP chose Narendra Modi as its prime ministerial candidate last September, Indian shares have been on a bull run. The Sensex has gained over 19 percent — a rise described by traders as a vote of confidence in the Hindu hardliner’s ability to turn around India’s struggling economy. Stocks have risen more than 5 percent alone since voting began in early April in the multi-phased parliamentary election.
“The possibility of the Sensex touching 25,000 is still very much there because there will be reaction to the exit polls tomorrow and final results on Friday,” said Alok Churiwala, head of Churiwala Securities in Mumbai. AFP
