SBI, PNB keep Nifty Bank index up on Tuesday

NEW DELHI: The Nifty Bank index finished Tuesday's session with tepid gains of 0.10 per cent at 25,778.

State Bank of India remained the top gainer of the index, rising 4.60 per cent despite it reported a whopping Rs 7,718 crore loss for March quarter as bad provisions doubled to Rs 22,096 crore from Rs 11,740 crore in the same quarter last year.

Shares of Punjab National Bank jumped 3.71 per cent.

IDFC Bank (up 2.73 per cent), Bank of Baroda (up 2.23 per cent), Federal Bank (up 1.85 per cent), ICICI Bank (up 0.93 per cent), RBL Bank (up 0.36 per cent) and YES Bank (up 0.10 per cent) also remained in the club of gainers.

On the other hand, IndusInd Bank (down 1.56 per cent), Kotak Mahindra Bank (down 0.87 per cent), Axis Bank (down 0.77 per cent) and HDFC Bank (down 0.16 per cent) finished among losers.

Equity benchmarks Sensex and Nifty snapped five-day losing streak on Tuesday on gains led by metal, auto and pharma stocks amid mixed global cues.

However, concerns over rising global oil prices and precarious rupee against the US dollar kept market sentiment restricted.

The Sensex closed the day 0.10 per cent up at 34,651, while the Nifty finished at 10,537, up by 20 points or 0.19 per cent.

In the Sensex kitty 19 stocks closed the day in the green and 12 in the red, whereas in the Nifty pack, 31 remained in the green, 18 in the red and 1 unchanged.

Bajaj Finserv, Bajaj Finance, Berger Paints, DSP BlackRock Liquid ETF and Magma Fincorp were the 5 stocks that hit 52-week highs on NSE on Tuesday.