Taking cues from the overseas markets and backed by the new-found optimism, the Sensex opened with a positive gap of 56 points at 14,720.

Aggressive buying, in heavyweights Bharti Airtel [Get Quote], SBI [Get Quote] and Hindustan Unilever, pushed the index to a new, all-time intra-day high of 14,828 - just 172 points shy of the 15,000-mark. The Sensex finally ended the day at a record 14,806 - up 142 points.

The Nifty touched a new, all-time intra-day high at 4363 before closing at a record 4358 - up 44 points.

The BSE Bankex rallied nearly 2% to 8141, and the FMCG index added 1.3% to 1848.

The breadth was fairly positive on the BSE - out of 2,714 stocks traded, 1,440 advanced, 1,197 declined and 77 were unchanged today.

LEADING THE RALLY

Bharti Airtel and SBI soared around 3.5% each to Rs 867 and Rs 1,582, respectively. Grasim [Get Quote] and Hindustan Unilever surged around 3% each to Rs 2,703 and Rs 195, respectively.

Cipla, Maruti [Get Quote], ICICI Bank [Get Quote] and Ambuja Cements rallied around 1.7% each to Rs 214, Rs 784, Rs 966 and Rs 124, respectively.

ITC, Reliance Communications [Get Quote], Reliance and Tata Steel [Get Quote] advanced around 1.3% each to Rs 156, Rs 537, Rs 1,705 and Rs 601, respectively.

Larsen & Toubro, Satyam [Get Quote] and BHEL were up around 1% each at Rs 2,259, Rs 471 and Rs 1,547, respectively.

Reliance Energy [Get Quote], HDFC [Get Quote] and Bajaj Auto [Get Quote] slipped around 1.5% each to Rs 614, Rs 1,998 and Rs 2,098, respectively. ONGC [Get Quote] was down almost 1% at Rs 888.

MOST ACTIVE COUNTERS

Indiabulls Real Estate [Get Quote] topped the value chart with a turnover of Rs 158.40 crore (Rs 1.58 billion) followed by SBI (Rs 157.50 crore or Rs 1.57 billion), Reliance (Rs 114 crore or Rs 1.14 billion), Parsvnath (Rs 99.70 crore or Rs 0.99 billion) and IFCI (Rs 98.70 crore or Rs 0.98 billion).

IFCI led the volume chart with trades of around 1.59 crore shares followed by Reliance Natural Resources [Get Quote] (1.23 crore), Himachal Futursitic (1.22 crore), Nagarjuna Fertilisers (91.90 lakh) and Meghmani Organics (79.80 lakh).