The Nifty ended the day with gains of 38.90 points, while the Sensex gained 115 points (provisional). Among the gainers in today's trade was Bharti Airtel, which surged more than 4% on strong buying interest at lower levels.

Other stocks that ended the day with substantial gains were the infrastructure and metals pack including shares of BHEL, Tata Steel, Hindalco, Ultratech Cement, Jaiprakash Associates.

Private sector banking names were subdued and ended the day with marginal gains. PSU banking stocks, however, saw renewed buying interest on hopes that the banking laws ammendment bill would be passed.

PSU banking stocks that rallied in trade were Bank of India, Syndicate Bank, State Bank of India, Indian Overseas Bank and Andhra Bank.

IT stocks ended the day almost flat with TCS, Infosys and Wipro being subdued. Heavyweight, Reliance Industries and ITC also ended the day almost flat.

Pharma stocks like Cipla and Sun Pharma also rallied as investors continued to buy into defensives. Among non index stocks Jet Airways ended the day little changed after rallying over the last few trading sessions following hopes of a stake sell to Etihad Airways.

Meanwhile, markets in Asia ended the day with gains, while Europe was trading higher on hopes that the fiscal cliff in the US would be resolved.

The UK's FTSE, the French CAC and the German DAX were all trading firmly in the green. Indian markets are expected to take cues from global developments, given that the RBI policy is now behind. Markets would most likely show volatility ahead of the year end. Most analysts are expecting the indices to trend higher given global liquidity conditions.

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