ICICI Prudential Life Insurance, which listed at a discount to its issue price of Rs 334, last September, has been rising steadily to scale new levels. On Tuesday, the stock hit a fresh 52-week high of Rs 507.90 in early sesion before receding to Rs 494 at around 1.35 pm. Other stocks that hit new year highs included Tata Steel, Ashok Leyland, Grasim Industries, Deepak Fertilizers, Page Industries, Thomas Cook India Ltd. and Aditya Birla Nuva.
ICICI Prudential Life Insurance's net profit rose by a marginal 1.9 percent to Rs 1,681.66 crore for 2016-17 from Rs 1,650.15 crore in the preceding fiscal, mainly due to a rise in net commission paid, from Rs 619.98 crore in 2015-16 to Rs 758.92 crore, according to its regulatory filing to the BSE.
Total net premium collection in 2016-17 stood at Rs 22,155 crore, up 16.6 percent from Rs 18,998 crore in fiscal 2016.
Read: ICICI Prudential Life Insurance continues to disappoint investors
Ashok Leyland scaled a new high of Rs 102 on sustained buying after the company's upbeat volume sales for June. The Chennai-based commercial vehicle (CV) maker sold 12,330 units, a growth of 11 percent YoY, marking a significant departure from 8 percent fall in May and 30 percent drop in April.
Tata Steel hit Rs 554.35, Grindwell Norton Rs 437, Godrej Consumer Products Rs 993.20 and Marico Rs 330, marking fresh 52-week highs for these stocks.
Other buzzing stocks on the BSE include Yes Bank, Wockhardt, Sun Pharma and Cipla.
The BSE Sensex was up 18 points higher at 31,244 while the NSE Nifty was up 6 points at 9,621.
Staying with NSE, the exchange's much-talked about initial public offering (IPO) is likely to be delayed further as the capital markets regulator Sebi wants a resolution of the algo-trading case before the bourse hits the primary market. The BSE went public in February this year.
The NSE had filed documents for IPO in December last year, via the OFS route that would see its existing investors partially offload their stakes.
