The last day of September F&O series was relatively volatile as the markets saw alternate bouts of buying and selling. However, very strong gains for the banking stocks and positive trend across Asia held the indices up.
Indices opened the day with modest gains but slipped soon after. They moved sideways till noon before starting a rally which took them to their intra-day highs in early afternoon trades.
There was higher volatility in the afternoon as the indices gave up all their gains. The Nifty slipped deep into the red while the Sensex held around yesterday's closing levels.
Sensex closed with gains of 14 points at 12381 and the Nifty lost 7 points to close at 3572. Nifty October futures closed at a premium of 12 points to the spot index.
Banking and financial stocks rallied for the third straight session has hopes of declining interest rates strengthened. Most bankers talking to the media were confident that the risks of further rate hikes have subsided considerably. The Bank Nifty was the best performing sectoral index, rallying nearly 4 per cent.