Sensex crosses 52,000 for the first time

Mumbai, Feb 15 (IANS) The Indian equity market surged on Monday morning with the BSE Sensex crossing the 52,000 mark for the first time ever.Around 9.56 a.m., Sensex was trading at 52,053.80, higher by 509.50 points or 0.99 per cent from its previous close of 51,544.30.It opened at 51,907.75 and has so far touched an intra-day high of 52,110.74 and a low of 51,886.46 points.The Nifty50 on the National Stock Exchange was trading at 15,294.95, higher by 131.65 points or 0.87 per cent from its previous close.The rise in the Indian indices came on the back of positive global cues.Healthy buying in the banking, finance and telecom stocks also supported the market.Manish Hathiramani, technical analyst with Deen Dayal Investments: "The Nifty has opened the week with a gap up and is headed to its next target of 15,500. We have a good support for the index at 15,100 and until that does not break on a closing basis, we can buy on dips or intra-day corrections. Traders are advised to maintain stops and book profits at regular intervals."The top gainers on the Sensex were IndusInd Bank, Bharti Airtel and Axis Bank, while ONGC, Tata Steel and Mahindra & Mahindra were the major losers.
--IANS rrb/sn/in