Mumbai: The Bombay Stock Exchange benchmark Sensex rose by 87 points in opening trade on Thursday, driven by a firming trend on other Asian bourses. In addition, covering up of pending short positions in the last session before August month expiry in the derivatives segment on the National Stock Exchange on Thursday supported the recovery in stock prices. The 30-share BSE index, which lost 213.49 points in Wednesday''s session, recovered by 87.00 points, or 0.53 percent, to 16,371.98 in opening trade. In a similar fashion, the wide-based National Stock Exchange Nifty index moved up by 27.75 points, or 0.54 percent, to 4,915.85. Brokers attributed the initial recovery in stock prices to a firming trend on other Asian markets in tandem with overnight gains in the US market following an upbeat report on durable goods orders. Furthermore, short-covering by speculators in the last session before current month expiry in the derivatives segment also helped the trading sentiment to improve, they said. Meanwhile, in the Asian region, Japan's Nikkei Index rose by 1.43 per cent and Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index by 1.42 percent in early trade on Thursday. The Dow Jones Industrial Average ended 1.29 percent higher in the previous session.