Little Movement Anticipated For Singapore Shares

(RTTNews) - The Singapore stock market on Monday wrote a finish to the modest two-day winning streak in which it had collected almost 20 points or 0.6 percent. The Straits Times Index now sits just beneath the 3,210-point plateau and it's likely to remain in that neighborhood again on Tuesday.

The global forecast for the Asian markets is mixed and flat ahead of key employment data later this week. The European markets were down and the U.S. bourses were mixed and the Asian markets figure to split the difference.

The STI finished slightly lower on Monday following losses from the financial shares and mixed performances from the properties and industrials.

For the day, the index slipped 8.55 points or 0.27 percent to finish at 3,208.86 after trading between 3,197.75 and 3,231.10.

Among the actives, Ascendas REIT plunged 2.18 percent, while CapitaLand Integrated Commercial Trust declined 1.62 percent, CapitaLand Investment sank 0.32 percent, City Developments shed 0.30 percent, Comfort DelGro skidded 0.77 percent, DBS Group fell 0.15 percent, Emperador slumped 0.98 percent, Genting Singapore climbed 1.18 percent, Hongkong Land gained 0.28 percent, Keppel Corp lost 0.29 percent, Mapletree Pan Asia Commercial Trust tanked 2.10 percent, Mapletree Industrial Trust tumbled 1.77 percent, Mapletree Logistics Trust plummeted 2.98 percent, Oversea-Chinese Banking Corporation eased 0.08 percent, SATS added 0.77 percent, Seatrium Limited dropped 0.75 percent, SembCorp Industries jumped 1.57 percent, Singapore Technologies Engineering retreated 1.02 percent, SingTel advanced 0.83 percent and Thai Beverage, Wilmar International, Yangzijiang Financial, Yangzijiang Shipbuilding and UOL Group were unchanged.

The lead from Wall Street offers little clarity as the major averages opened mixed on Monday and finished the same way, little changed.

The Dow shed 74.15 points or 0.22 percent to finish at 33,433.35, while the NASDAQ jumped 88.45 points or 0.67 percent to close at 13,307.77 and the S&P 500 perked 0.34 points or 0.01 percent to end at 4,288.39.

Concerns about the outlook for interest rates continued to hang over the markets ahead of the release of the Labor Department's closely watched monthly jobs report on Friday.

Negative sentiment was also generated in reaction to a surge by treasury yields, with the yield on the benchmark 10-year note jumping to its highest level in almost sixteen years.

In economic news, the Institute for Supply Management noted a modest slowdown in the pace of contraction in U.S. manufacturing activity in September. Also, the Commerce Department said construction spending in the U.S. increased in line with estimates in August.

Crude oil prices fell sharply on Monday, hurt by a stronger dollar and concerns about prospects of rising supplies in the market. West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures for November sank $1.97 or 2.2 percent at $88.82 a barrel.