Indian shares extended their record-high closing streak to a third day on Monday, driven by a Tata Steel-led rally in metal stocks, and as Reliance Industries rose after a report said it was in advanced talks to sell stake in the company.
The blue-chip NSE Nifty 50 index ended up 0.21% at 16,563.05 and the benchmark S&P BSE Sensex rose 0.26% to 55,582.58.
Shares of Reliance rose 1.3% after Bloomberg News reported Saudi Aramco was in advanced talks to acquire a 20% stake in the Indian conglomerate's oil refining and chemicals business for about $20 billion to $25 billion in Aramco's shares.
The Nifty energy index settled up 0.55% during the session.
The Nifty Metal index ended 1.5% higher, led by Tata Steel that hit a record high of 1534.5 rupees.
The steelmaker last week reported a consolidated net profit of 97.68 billion rupees ($1.32 billion) in the June quarter, compared with a loss of 46.48 billion rupees a year earlier. Brokerages also raised their target prices on the company's expectations for better realisations in both India and Europe.
Hindustan Zinc, which ended up 3.1%, and Vedanta, which rose 2.4%, were the other top gainers in the sector.
"Metal has seen a lot of action the past few weeks, and there are a lot of triggers for that, the most important of them being a demand revival across the board, whether it is raw material or real estate," said Gaurav Garg, head of research at CapitalVia Global Research.
Global shares slid on Monday after a raft of Chinese economic indicators showed a sharp slowdown in the engine of global growth.
