Additional Support Expected For Singapore Stock Market

(RTTNews) - Ahead of Monday's holiday for Vesak Day, the Singapore stock market had ended the two-day slide in which it had dropped more than 80 points or 1.6 percent. The Straits Times Index now sits just beneath the 5,040-point plateau and it may see further upside on Tuesday.

The global forecast for the Asian markets suggests mild upside on support from the technology shares. The European markets were down and the U.S. bourses were up and the Asian markets figure to follow the latter lead.

The STI finished sharply higher on Friday following gains from the financial shares, property stocks and industrial issues.

For the day, the index advanced 48.67 points or 0.98 percent to finish at 5,037.86 after trading between 5,009.77 and 5,041.11.

Among the actives, CapitaLand Ascendas REIT lost 0.40 percent, while CapitaLand Integrated Commercial Trust shed 0.44 percent, CapitaLand Investment dropped 1.55 percent, City Developments spiked 2.51 percent, DBS Group jumped 1.47 percent, DFI Retail Group and Frasers Logistics both advanced 1.01 percent, Genting Singapore increased 0.84 percent, Hongkong Land rose 0.26 percent, Keppel DC REIT improved 0.87 percent, Keppel Ltd gained 0.37 percent, Mapletree Pan Asia Commercial Trust added 0.79 percent, Mapletree Logistics Trust rallied 1.69 percent, Oversea-Chinese Banking Corporation and Singapore Airlines both climbed 1.04 percent, SATS vaulted 1.32 percent, Seatrium Limited tumbled 2.30 percent, SembCorp Industries expanded 1.27 percent, Singapore Exchange accelerated 2.00 percent, Singapore Technologies Engineering soared 3.08 percent, SingTel sank 0.46 percent, United Overseas Bank fell 0.24 percent, UOL Group strengthened 1.40 percent, Wilmar International surged 5.90 percent and Yangzijiang Shipbuilding, Mapletree Industrial Trust and Thai Beverage were unchanged.

The lead from Wall Street is positive as the major averages opened under water on Monday but quickly started to trend higher, finally ending at fresh record closing highs.

The Dow added 46.42 points or 0.09 percent to finish at 51,078.88. while the NASDAQ climbed 114.19 points or 0.42 percent to end at 27,086.81 and the S&P 500 rose 19.90 points or 0.26 percent to close at 7,599.96.

The higher close on Wall Street partly reflected strength among tech stocks after Nvidia (NVDA) unveiled a new superchip RTX Spark in collaboration with Microsoft (MSFT) that the company said reinvents Windows PCs for the era of personal AI agents.

Buying interest was somewhat subdued, however, as the price of crude oil surged in reaction to the latest developments regarding the conflict in the Middle East.

Crude oil prices skyrocketed Monday on reports the U.S. and Iran exchanging attacks while the U.S. is yet to endorse a negotiated settlement to end the war. West Texas Intermediate crude for July delivery was up $4.64 or 5.31 percent at $92.00 per barrel.

However, crude oil prices pulled back off their highs after President Donald Trump said talks with Iran are continuing at a "rapid pace," while positive communications with Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu and Hezbollah also spurred hopes for an end to the war.