Mumbai– Healthy foreign funds inflow, along with strong buying support for the financial sector, lifted the key Indian equity indices on Friday.

However, overseas equity markets stalled on Friday as the surge of coronavirus cases across the world threatened global economic recovery.

Nevertheless, Indian markets received healthy foreign inflows of Rs 3,860.78 crore.

Accordingly, buying was witnessed in telecom, banking, finance and consumer durables stocks.

In the process, Indian markets outperformed all Asian markets except Singapore.

The S&P BSE Sensex closed at 43,882.25, higher by 282.29 points, or 0.65 per cent, from its previous close of 43,599.96.

It had opened at 43,732.14, and touched an intra-day high of 44,013.02 and a low of 43,453.75 points.

Similarly, the Nifty50 on the National Stock Exchange closed at 12,859.05, higher by 87.35 points, or 0.68 per cent, from its previous close.

“Nifty ended the week with gains of 0.6 per cent – the smallest gain in the past three weeks. This reflects the conflicting state of markets after showing continuous upward movement since late September,” said Deepak Jasani, Head of Retail Research at HDFC Securities.

“The fact that market manages to turn upwards on an intra day or overnight basis after dipping is heartening, keeping hopes of some more upmove alive. In terms of Nifty 12,963 remains a resistance while 12,730 remains a support.”

According to Siddhartha Khemka, Head – Retail Research, Motilal Oswal Financial Services: “Global cues were mixed amidst the news that the US Treasury was ending all the emergency loan programmes, while California announced curfews to curtail surging coronavirus infections.”

“On the domestic side, profit booking was seen in the first half but Nifty bounced back latter supported by banks and financials. The buying interest was seen post the news that RBI has recommended significant changes across the banking sector, ranging from a higher promoter stake over a long period of time, the entry of corporate houses into banking and permitting large non-bank lenders to convert into banks.” (IANS)