Markets have surged in late trade on the back of buying in banking, pharma, realty, FMCG, auto, power and major oil stocks. It was cautious till afternoon session and traded with some volatility ahead of vote of confidence tomorrow, which will decide UPAs continuation as a government. However, capital goods and select technology stocks were under selling pressure.

Volumes were very low as investors kept positions low ahead of the political event. Total turnover traded by markets stood at Rs 58,966.97 crore. This includes Rs 10,630.65 crore from NSE Cash segment, Rs 43,942.21 crore from NSE F&O and the balance Rs 4,394.11 crore from BSE Cash segment.

The Sensex has touched an intraday high of 13,878.88 and low of 13,581.19 before closing the day at 13,850.04, up by 214.64 points or 1.57%. Nifty ended with a gain of 67.25 points or 1.64% at 4159.50 after hitting a high/low of 4168.15 and 4072.75, respectively.

Reliance Industries, ICICI Bank, HDFC Bank, SBI, NTPC, ONGC and Reliance Communication were top contributors in the gain of broader indices.

Rate sensitive sectors like banking, auto and realty continued their sharp run up on first day of week as well as it rallied on last two days of earlier week.  

Bankex outperformed other indices, gained 239.82 points or 3.88% to settle at 6,428.71. Buying was seen in Bank of Baroda, Union Bank, Bank of India, IOB, HDFC Bank, PNB, ICICI Bank and SBI, which went up 3.5%-7%.

Healthcare index surged 120.88 points or 3.03% at 4,111.73 on the back of buying in Sun Pharma, Cipla, Ranbaxy Labs, Glenmark, Dishman Pharma, Orchid Chemical, Biocon and Dr Reddys Labs.

Cipla surged 5% after its first quarter numbers. Its sales were above expectation supported by strong exports and net profits jumped by 17% despite Rs 75 crore forex loss. OPMs improved on account of lower base and better product mix.

Dr Reddys Labs gained 2% after earnings. Sales numbers were above expectations while OPMs disappointed. Another news was that its board has approved to buy back the ICICI Ventures & Citi's stake in Perlecan. Sources say the company will buy shares in range of mid Rs 50 per share and will hold 100% stake in Perlican Pharma post buyback.

Realty stocks like HDIL, Indiabulls Real, Anant Raj Ind, Unitech, Orbit Corporation and DLF have moved up smartly. Index was up by 114.04 points or 2.44% at 4,784.28.

Housing Development and Infrastructure (HDIL) surged nearly 8% after first quarter numbers. It has posted net profit of Rs 317.9 crore for quarted ended June 2008 as against Rs 202.7 crore in same period of last year and net sales of Rs 570 crore versus Rs 443 crore YoY.

Auto Index rose 62.23 points or 1.73% to close at 3,663.16 as buying was seen in Punj Tractors, Bajaj Auto, Hero Honda, Maruti Suzuki, Cummins, Bharat Forge and M&M.

FMCG stocks like HUL, ITC, Dabur India, Godrej Consumer and Nestle were on buyers radar. Index jumped 33.62 points or 1.68% at 2,029.66.

Power stocks also charged up fully, which include Power Grid Corp, Lanco Infratech, NTPC, GVK Power, Tata Power, Neyveli Lignite and Reliance Infra. Index was up 1.15% at 2,409.24.

Metal stocks like NALCO, SAIL, Hind Zinc, Sterlite Ind, Tata Steel and Jindal Steel were witnessing buying interest. Index gained by 97.85 points or 0.84% at 11,766.24.

Government owned company, SAIL reported good numbers for first quarter of FY09. Its standalone net profit increased by 20.33% at Rs 1835.19 crore as against Rs 1525.12 crore and net sales up by 37.19% at Rs 11,029.4 crore from Rs 8,039.5 crore YoY.

Oil & Gas Index gained 0.84% or 77.12 points at 9,309.16 due to buying in Reliance Industries and ONGC, which rose nearly 1.4-2%. However, selling was seen in Essar Oil, BPCL, HPCL, Cairn India, Petronet LNG and IOC.

However, IT Index ended flat at 3,580.41. Selling was seen in Satyam, i-Flex Solution, Mphasis, HCL Tech, Financial Tech while buying in TCS, Wipro, Tech Mahindra and Infosys.

Tech Mahindra surged nearly 2% as the company reported consolidated net profit of Rs 258.54 crore for first quarter of FY09 as against net loss of Rs 221.1 crore and net sales of Rs 1,116.38 crore versus Rs 1,021.8 crore, QoQ basis.

Capital Goods Index fell 83.65 points or 0.75% at 11,062.86 due to selling in Bharat Elec, Alstom Projects, Crompton Greaves, Jyoti Structure, BHEL, L&T and Thermax.

Amongst frontliners, NALCO jumped 8.05%, Power Grid Corp 5.63%, Hero Honda 5.61%, Sun Pharma 5.28%, Cipla 5.20%, HDFC Bank 4.78%, Ranbaxy Labs 4.74%, NTPC 4.70% and ICICI Bank 4.29% while Satyam lost 4.14%, HCL Tech -2.82%, BPCL -2.41%, Cairn India -2.37%, Ambuja Cements -2.17%, BHEL -1.56% and L&T -1.26%.

BSE Midcap Index was up 0.34% at 5,256.99 while Small Cap Index lost 0.28% at 6,437.98.

Reliance Industries, L&T, Reliance Comm, Reliance Infra, ICICI Bank and HDFC were most active counters on the bourses.

Market breadth was positive; about 1341 shares have advanced while 1564 shares declined. Nearly 245 shares remained unchanged.

Asian markets were trading strong. Hang Seng, Kospi, Straits Times and Taiwan Weighted fell over 2.5-3%. Jakarta Composite was up 1.7%.