Mild Upside Seen For Thai Stock Market

(RTTNews) - The Thai stock market has alternated between positive and negative finishes through the last six trading days since the end of the five-day winning streak in which it had advanced more than 50 points or 4.3 percent. The Stock Exchange of Thailand now sits just above the 1,215-point plateau and it's poised to inch higher again on Thursday.

The global forecast for the Asian markets is murky as uncertainty about U.S. trade policies continues to weigh. The European markets were down and the U.S. bourses were mostly higher and the Asian markets figure to split the difference.

The SET finished slightly higher on Wednesday as gains from the consumer and technology sectors were offset by weakness from the financial, resource and industrial shares.

For the day, the index rose 2.32 points or 0.19 percent to finish at 1,216.71 after trading between 1,207.21 and 1,218.64. Volume was 8.390 billion shares worth 43.111 billion baht. There were 304 decliners and 196 gainers, with 167 stocks finishing unchanged.

Among the actives, Advanced Info fell 0.33 percent, while Bangkok Dusit Medical increased 0.41 percent, Bangkok Expressway slumped 3.25 percent, B. Grimm tumbled 3.28 percent, BTS Group plunged 3.66 percent, CP All Public dropped 0.97 percent, Charoen Pokphand Foods jumped 1.92 percent, Energy Absolute accelerated 2.42 percent, Gulf retreated 1.52 percent, Krung Thai Bank shed 0.44 percent, Krung Thai Card plummeted 8.99 percent, PTT Oil & Retail sank 0.74 percent, PTT improved 0.81 percent, PTT Exploration and Production gained 0.49 percent, PTT Global Chemical crashed 4.95 percent, SCG Packaging stumbled 3.49 percent, Siam Concrete surrendered 2.86 percent, Thai Oil declined 1.80 percent, True Corporation rallied 3.11 percent, TTB Bank collected 0.53 percent andBangkok Bank, Kasikornbank, Siam Commercial Bank, Asset World, Banpu and Thailand Airport were unchanged.

The lead from Wall Street is mixed to higher as the major averages opened in the green but spent most of the day bouncing back and forth across the unchanged line before finally ending mixed.

The Dow slumped 89.37 points or 0.21 percent to finish at 42,051.06, while the NASDAQ rallied 136.72 points or 0.72 percent to close at 19,146.81 and the S&P 500 rose 6.03 points or 0.10 percent to end at 5,892.58.

The choppy trading on Wall Street came as traders took a step back to assess the recent rally by the markets, which has seen the S&P 500 rebound strongly from its early April lows to turn positive for 2025.

While trade deals between the U.S. and China and the U.K. have helped ease concerns about President Donald Trump's trade policies, uncertainty about the eventual outcome continues to hang over the markets.

Traders also were reluctant to make more significant moves ahead of the release of a slew of U.S. economic data on Thursday, including producer prices, retail sales and industrial production. A speech by Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell is also likely to attract attention.

Crude oil prices slipped again on Wednesday, after data showed that U.S. crude inventories unexpectedly jumped last week. West Texas Intermediate crude for June delivery shed 0.80 or 1.27 percent to 62.87 per barrel.