Mild Upside Seen For Singapore Stock Market

(RTTNews) - The Singapore stock market has moved lower in two of three trading days since the end of the three-day winning streak in which it had gained more than 20 points or 0.7 percent. The Straits Times Index now sits just above the 3,190-point plateau and it's likely to hug that line again on Monday.

The global forecast for the Asian markets suggests little movement and uncertainty thanks to the ongoing hostilities in the Middle East. The European markets were up and the U.S. bourses were mixed and little changed and the Asian markets figure to follow the latter lead.

The STI finished modestly lower on Friday following losses from the financial shares, property stocks and industrial issues.

For the day, the index slipped 9.69 points or 0.30 percent to finish at 3,191.72 after trading between 3,182.26 and 3,199.30.

Among the actives, Ascendas REIT and DBS Group both lost 0.34 percent, while CapitaLand Integrated Commercial Trust, CapitaLand Investment and Genting Singapore all stumbled 0.99 percent, City Developments retreated 1.08 percent, Emperador rallied 0.99 percent, Hongkong Land plummeted 3.19 percent, Keppel DC REIT dropped 0.54 percent, Keppel Ltd sank 0.43 percent, Mapletree Pan Asia Commercial Trust tumbled 1.32 percent, Mapletree Industrial Trust slumped 0.80 percent, Mapletree Logistics Trust declined 1.18 percent, Oversea-Chinese Banking Corporation eased 0.08 percent, SATS added 0.34 percent, Seatrium Limited advanced 0.89 percent, SembCorp Industries skidded 0.55 percent, Singapore Technologies Engineering rose 0.26 percent, SingTel jumped 1.26 percent, Thai Beverage plunged 1.83 percent and Wilmar International, Yangzijiang Financial, Yangzijiang Shipbuilding and Comfort DelGro were unchanged.

The lead from Wall Street is of little help as the major averages opened slightly higher on Friday but then hugged both sides of the line for the rest of the session, ending mixed and little changed.

The Dow sank 118.04 points or 0.31 percent to finish at 37,592.98, while the NASDAQ rose 2.58 points or 0.02 percent to close at 14,972.76 and the S&P 500 perked 3.59 points or 0.08 percent to end at 4,783.83. For the week, the NASDAQ spiked 3.1 percent, the S&P added 1.8 percent and the Dow rose 0.3 percent.

The Dow was weighed by earnings news from the likes of UnitedHealth (UNH), Bank of America (BAC), Wells Fargo (WFC) and JPMorgan Chase (JPM).

Traders were also reacting to a Labor Department report showing U.S. producer prices unexpectedly edged lower in December, adding to recent uncertainty about the outlook for interest rates.

Oil futures settled notably higher on Friday as an escalation in tensions in the Middle East raised concerns about delay in supplies. West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures for February ended higher by $0.66 or 0.9 percent at $72.68 a barrel. For the week, the contract shed about 1.1 percent.