The total market valuation of all BSE-listed firms today regained the Rs 100-trillion mark as the benchmark Sensex climbed over 600 points after the RBI surprisingly cut interest rate by 25 basis points.
Measured in terms of total market capitalisation of all listed companies on the country’s biggest bourse BSE, the overall investor wealth in the Indian stock market rose to Rs 1,00,07,341 crore in morning trade.
The Sensex was trading 619.66 points higher at 27,966.48 as rate-sensitive stocks led rally.
Shedding its hawkish stance after 18 months, the Reserve Bank today sprang a surprise effecting a 0.25 per cent cut in interest rate that sent the markets soaring and raised expectations of lower EMIs for home and auto loans in the near future.
Though resisting nudges from the government and demands from the industry for long, the central bank decided to cut the benchmark lending rate or the repo rate a fortnight ahead of the scheduled monetary policy review on February 3, apparently on the back of a softening inflation.
Those commanding market cap of over Rs 2 lakh crore include ONGC, ITC, RIL, Infosys, HDFC Bank, SBI, Coal India and ICICI Bank. Besides, HDFC, Sun Pharma, HUL, Bharti Airtel, L&T, Wipro, Tata Motors, HCL Tech, NTPC and Axis Bank have market cap of over Rs 1 lakh crore each.
The BSE is among the world’s ten largest exchanges in terms of market value, while it is the largest globally for number of firms listed on its platform. It has over 4,100 actively traded companies and nearly 2.7 crore investors trade on it.