On Friday, November 6, the Nifty 50 surged 2.01% to close at 25,030.35, while the BSE Sensex gained 2.17% to settle at 81,028.02. Both benchmark indices ended at their highest levels in more than eight months. The Nifty and Sensex extended their winning streaks to seven consecutive sessions, marking their longest such runs in 14 months and 26 months, respectively.
The performance of Indian equities stood in sharp contrast to several technology-heavy Asian markets, which suffered significant losses. South Korea's Kospi and Japan's Nikkei each declined 6% on Friday, while Taiwan's benchmark index dropped 4.5%. The losses followed a sharp overnight retreat on Wall Street as concerns increased over the returns from massive investments in artificial intelligence infrastructure.
For the week, the Nifty and Sensex advanced 8.6% and 8.8%, respectively. This marked their strongest weekly performance since February 2021, when optimism surrounding India's COVID-19 vaccination campaign supported a major stock market rally.
According to Fident Asset Management, the outcome of the US elections could also influence market sentiment. The results have raised expectations of greater checks on US President Donald Trump's trade and geopolitical agenda, potentially reducing the risk of further disruptions and pointing towards softer crude oil prices.
Foreign institutional investors played a significant role in driving the recovery. They purchased Indian shares worth approximately 150 billion rupees (.6 billion) on Thursday, marking their largest single-day net investment in nearly six years. Their renewed buying activity provided substantial support to the domestic market after largely staying away from Indian equities during 2026.
The weekly rally also reduced the gap between Indian benchmark indices and their emerging-market counterparts in terms of year-to-date performance. Despite the latest gains, the Nifty and Sensex remain down 4.2% and 4.9%, respectively, in 2026. In comparison, the MSCI Emerging Markets index has gained 7% during the same period.
Indian information technology stocks also outperformed, with investors viewing the sector as relatively insulated from the capital-intensive investments required to build AI infrastructure. The Nifty IT index advanced 0.4% on Friday, taking its gains over the previous two sessions to nearly 2.9%.
Analysts at Anand Rathi, Apoorva Khandelwal and Sushovon Nayak, said the market could increasingly distinguish between companies financing the development of AI infrastructure and businesses positioned to generate revenue from enterprise adoption of the technology with lower capital requirements.
The broader market also participated in the rally, with all 16 major sectors recording weekly gains. The small-cap and mid-cap indices advanced 2.8% and 5.8%, respectively, reflecting the strength of the broader market recovery.
Financial stocks emerged as major contributors to the weekly gains, supported by renewed foreign investor inflows. The Nifty Financial Services index climbed 10.4%, while the private banking index advanced 9.1%.
Among individual stocks, HDFC Bank and ICICI Bank recorded gains of 13.8% and 12.4%, respectively. Both lenders registered their strongest weekly performances in approximately six years.
The sharp recovery in Indian equities, supported by foreign institutional buying, falling crude prices and gains across major sectors, marked a significant turnaround for the domestic market amid a broader global technology-led selloff.
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