Sensex, Nifty Rally On GST Reforms Push

(RTTNews) - Indian shares rose sharply on Monday after Prime Minister Narendra Modi unveiled plans of the biggest tax overhaul since 2017 over the weekend, boosting stocks across sectors like auto, financial, real estate, consumer and cement.

With robust GST collections and a broad tax base, government sources indicated that nearly 90 percent of the items in the 28 percent slab will now move to 18 percent.

Almost all the goods in the 12 percent slab will move to 5 percent, thus effectively making nearly all essential goods and household items cheaper.

Analysts said the GST reforms and rate cuts that would come into effect around Diwali this year would help offset the fallout from higher U.S. tariffs.

S&P upgraded India's rating to BBB, from BBB- with a stable outlook last week and said the economy's growth prospects won't be derailed by U.S. President Donald Trump administration's 50 percent tariff shock to the country.

Meanwhile, Friday's summit between U.S. President Donald Trump and Russian President Putin in Alaska yielded no concrete agreements, but Russia agreed to "game-changing" security guarantees for Ukraine, helping inject new momentum into stalled efforts to end the Russia-Ukraine war.

The leaders of the U.K., France and Germany will accompany Ukraine's president for crunch talks with Trump at the White House later today in a bid to come to a negotiated settlement in the three-and-a-half-year-old conflict.

The benchmark BSE Sensex hit an intraday high of 81,765 before paring some gains to end the session up 676 points, or 0.84 percent, at 81,273.75.

The broader NSE Nifty index closed up 245 points, or 1.0 percent, at 24,876.95, after hitting a high of 25,022 earlier.

The BSE mid-cap and small-cap indexes jumped 1 percent and 1.4 percent, respectively. The market breadth was strong on the BSE, with 2,561 shares rising while 1,633 shares declined and 171 shares closed unchanged.

Among the top gainers, Maruti Suzuki India soared more than 9 percent and Bajaj Finance climbed 5 percent.

Tata Steel, Tata Motors, Titan Company, Adani Ports, Asian Paints, Trent, Hindustan Unilever, Mahindra & Mahindra, Bajaj FinServ and UltraTech Cement rose 2-4 percent.