Little Movement Expected For Thai Stock Market

(RTTNews) - The Thai stock market has moved lower in consecutive trading days, surrendering almost 20 points or 1.3 percent in that span. The Stock Exchange of Thailand now sits just above the 1,525-point plateau and it may remain stuck in neutral on Tuesday.

The global forecast for the Asian markets is mixed and flat ahead of the Federal Reserve's monetary policy announcement later this week. The European markets were down and the U.S. bourses were barely higher and the Asian markets figure to split the difference.

The SET finished modestly lower on Monday following losses from the financial, industrial, food, energy and technology sectors.

For the day, the index sank 14.46 points or 0.94 percent to finish at 1,527.57 after trading between 1,525.47 and 1,539.40. Volume was 9.924 billion shares worth 42.575 billion baht. There were 419 decliners and 98 gainers, with 136 stocks finishing unchanged.

Among the actives, Thailand Airport was down 0.70 percent, while Banpu plummeted 3.16 percent, Bangkok Bank dropped 0.89 percent, B. Grimm plunged 3.88 percent, BTS Group rallied 2.10 percent, CP All Public slid 0.70 percent, Charoen Pokphand Foods tanked 2.30 percent, Energy Absolute declined 1.72 percent, Gulf weakened 1.60 percent, Kasikornbank skidded 1.15 percent, Krung Thai Bank weakened 1.05 percent, Krung Thai Card slumped 1.08 percent, PTT Oil & Retail fell 0.51 percent, PTT sank 2.86 percent, PTT Exploration and Production added 0.30 percent, PTT Global Chemical tumbled 2.10 percent, SCG Packaging retreated 1.28 percent, Siam Commercial Bank surrendered 2.19 percent, Siam Concrete lost 0.65 percent, Thai Oil dove 2.02 percent, True Corporation surged 2.72 percent, TTB Bank shed 0.58 percent and Asset World, Advanced Info, Bangkok Dusit Medical and Bangkok Expressway were unchanged.

The lead from Wall Street offers little guidance as the major averages opened lower on Monday, bounced higher to spend most of the day in the green but faded late to end barely above the unchanged line.

The Dow added 6.06 points or 0.02 percent to finish at 34,624.30, while the NASDAQ rose 1.90 points or 0.01 percent to close at 13,710.24 and the S&P 500 perked 3.21 points or 0.07 percent to end at 4,453.53.

The choppy trading on Wall Street came as traders seemed reluctant to make significant moves ahead of the Federal Reserve's monetary policy announcement on Wednesday.

The Fed is widely expected to leave interest rates unchanged, but traders will pay close attention to the accompanying statement and the central bank's projections for clues about the outlook for rates.

On the U.S. economic front, the National Association of Home Builders released a report showing homebuilder confidence in the U.S. has unexpectedly deteriorated in September.

Oil futures settled higher on Monday, rising for a third straight session on global supply issues and a weaker dollar. West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures for October rose $0.71 or 0.8 percent at $91.48 a barrel, the highest settlement this year.