Nifty rallies for third straight session, closes above 4600

The Sensex rallied for the third consecutive day led by buying across all the sectors. It surged over 800 points and the Nifty nearly 249 points in three sessions to close above 15,600 and 4640 levels, respectively. The broader indices outperformed the benchmark indices marginally in late trade, gained over 2.6%.

All the sectoral indices ended in the green; major buying was seen in realty, capital goods, metal, FMCG, auto and technology. Respective indices were up 2-4.7%.

Today's rally could also attributed to positive global cues. In the early trade, the Nifty had hit the 4600 mark and held this level throughout the session on the back of strong Asian cues. Among the Asian markets, Japan's Nikkei surged 3.35%; Hang Seng, Jakarta, Straits Times, Kospi and Taiwan Weighted went up 1.7-2.8%, and Shanghai rose 1.1%.

European cues also helped the markets. At the time of closing of Indian equities, European markets gained 0.7-0.8% and US index futures were trading marginally higher. Rally in US markets (which closed at fresh 2009 high) on Friday due to better-than-expected home sales data was also supportive in today's trade.

Jitendra Sriram, VP & Fund Manager-Equity at HSBC said the US housing stats were again giving a kind of an indicator that probably the worst was behind us. The markets have taken a very positive step. "A lot of the negativism that was prevailing around the Chinese market correction also seems to have unwound a little bit today in the market given that China has also recovered smartly and obviously sitting on both of these tailwinds the markets has done quite well."

On the liquidity front - he said, "Liquidity continues to be very strong and it does seem that the markets are attempting to move up a little bit higher."