The benchmark indices recovered from early losses to finish flat on Friday. Heavy losses in HDFC Bank shares dragged down benchmarks but gains in key players like Reliance Industries, State Bank of India, and Hindustan Unilever offset losses.

HDFC Bank shares ended with a loss of 4.50%, dragging the key indices most after the company’s June-quarter business updates showed a sequential fall in advances and deposits.

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The Sensex and the Nifty 50 ended mixed as the Sensex slipped 53 points, or 0.07%, to settle at 79,996.60. While the Nifty 50 ended 22 points, or 0.09%, up at 24,323.85.

The midcap and smallcap segments continued their record-setting march, aggravating concerns over their unsustainable valuations.

The BSE Midcap index hit its fresh all-time high of 47,484.71 during the session, closing 0.75% higher at 47,437.85. The BSE Smallcap index hit a fresh record high of 54,258.65 before ending 0.70% higher at 54,153.96.

The overall market capitalisation of firms listed on the BSE rose to nearly Rs 450 lakh crore from nearly Rs 447 lakh crore in the previous session.

Among the sectors, the Nifty Bank index fell 0.83%, and the Nifty Private Bank index fell 0.97%. On the other hand, the Nifty PSU Bank index clocked a gain of 1.25%.

Nifty Oil & Gas at 1.89%, Pharma at 1.29%, Healthcare at 1.27%, and FMCG at 1.08% ended with healthy gains.

On BSE, Reliance Industries, ICICI Bank, ICICI Lombard General Insurance Company, Federal Bank, HDFC Asset Management Company, BEL, HAL, Divi’s Labs, Dr Reddy’s Labs, Lupin, Persistent Systems, Siemens and Trent, hit their fresh 52-week highs in intraday trade.

On Nifty50, the top gainers were ONGC (4.06%), Reliance Industries (2.63%) and SBI (2.42%). The losers were HDFC Bank (4.50%), Titan Company (1.90%) and LTIMindtree (0.85%).

The Indian markets jumped 11% one month after the June 4 election results, driven by a robust rally fueled by renewed foreign investor interest in local stocks marking the strongest post-election surge since May 2019 and May 2014.

In May 2019, markets saw a slight dip of 0.1% one month after the elections, while in May 2014, they surged by 5.8%.

Major European markets rose ahead of the US non-farm payrolls report, and rising optimism about the Fed rate cuts kept global markets high.