Indonesia Shares May Head South Again On Friday

(RTTNews) - The Indonesia stock market on Thursday ended the two-day slide in which it had slumped almost 75 points or 1.2 percent. The Jakarta Composite Index now sits just beneath the 6,840-point plateau although it's likely to see renewed consolidation on Friday.

The global forecast for the Asian markets is mixed to lower on renewed concerns over the outlook for interest rates. The European markets were up and the U.S. bourses were down and the Asian markets figure to follow the latter lead.

The JCI finished modestly higher on Thursday following mixed performances from the financial shares, resource stocks and cement companies.

For the day, the index added 34.13 points or 0.50 percent to finish at 6,838.23 after trading between 6,794.73 and 6,865.08.

Among the actives, Bank CIMB Niaga shed 0.58 percent, while Bank Mandiri collected 0.43 percent, Bank Danamon Indonesia rose 0.37 percent, Bank Negara Indonesia slumped 0.41 percent, Bank Rakyat Indonesia declined 0.48 percent, Indosat Ooredoo Hutchison jumped 1.90 percent, Indocement skidded 1.03 percent, Semen Indonesia increased 0.39 percent, Indofood Suskes lost 0.39 percent, United Tractors perked 0.33 percent, Astra International added 0.44 percent, Energi Mega Persada plummeted 2.73 percent, Astra Agro Lestari gathered 0.36 percent, Aneka Tambang fell 0.30 percent, Vale Indonesia plunged 2.49 percent, Bumi Resources dropped 0.93 percent and Bank Central Asia and Timah were unchanged.

The lead from Wall Street is negative as the major averages opened flat on Thursday and hugged the line for the first half of the day before turning lower to end solidly in the red.

The Dow stumbled 220.33 points or 0.65 percent to finish at 33,891.94, while the NASDAQ sank 128.97 points or 0.94 percent to end at 13,521.45 and the S&P 500 lost 35.43 points or 0.81 percent to close at 4,347.35.

Stocks showed a notable drop in early afternoon trading after the Treasury Department revealed this month's auction of $24 billion worth of 30-year bonds attracted below average demand, triggering a surge in treasury yields.

The markets saw further downside as Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell addressed the outlook for U.S. monetary policy, saying the central bank "will not hesitate" to resume raising interest rates if it becomes appropriate.

Participating in a policy panel in Washington, D.C., Powell acknowledged that U.S. inflation has slowed over the past year but pointed out it remains well above the Fed's 2 percent target.

Crude oil prices climbed higher on Thursday after two straight sessions of decline on concerns about the outlook for energy demand. West Texas Intermediate crude oil futures for December rose $0.41 or 0.5 percent at $75.74 a barrel, due to some short-covering and bargain hunting.