Mumbai: The S&P BSE Sensex breached the 50,000-mark for the first time during the early trade on Thursday aided by market heavyweight Reliance Industries (RIL) and the Bajaj twins comprising of Bajaj Finserv and Bajaj Finance amid positive cues from the global market.
The Sensex surged 334.61 points (0.67 per cent) to hit a record high of 50,126.73, while the broader Nifty 50 too climbed 93.60 points (0.64 per cent) to touch a new lifetime high of 14,738.30.
RIL, Bajaj Finance, ICICI Bank and Axis Bank were leading contributors to the rise in Sensex during the early trade on Thursday.
On Wednesday, the Sensex had rallied 393.8 points, or 0.8 per cent, to close at 49,792.12. The Nifty 50 rallied by 123.85 points, or 0.85 per cent, to close at 14,644.7.
Among the sectoral indices on the National Stock Exchange (NSE), the Nifty Auto index was trading over 1 per cent higher on early trade Thursday driven by gains in the shares of Tata Motors, Eicher Motors and Bajaj Auto. The key Bank Nifty too was up around 0.5 per cent led by RBL Bank, IndusInd Bank and Bandhan Bank.
“The liquidity expansion by the central bank and the ample FII driven liquidity, a V shaped recovery of growth aided by the discovery of vaccine, and most recently the change of guard in US have been some of the factors propelling markets higher and higher. As the sensex crosses the 50,000, the valuations do look stretched. The valuations are a function of earnings and earnings not coming through remains the key risk at the current juncture,” said Joseph Thomas, Head Of Research at Emkay Wealth Management.
In the broader market, the S&P BSE MidCap index was up over 0.5 per cent at 19,268.97, while the S&P BSE SmallCap was trading at 18,837.02, up 0.50 per cent at around 10:00 am.