Singapore Stock Market May Find Support On Monday

(RTTNews) - The Singapore stock market has moved lower in four straight sessions, falling almost 100 points or 2.8 percent along the way. The Straits Times Index now sits just beneath the 3,720-point plateau although it may find traction on Monday.

The global forecast for the Asian markets is cautiously optimistic on an improved outlook for interest rates. The European markets were down and the U.S. bourses were up and the Asian markets are predicted to follow the latter lead.

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

For the day, the index slumped 42.95 points or 1.14 percent to finish at the daily low of 3,719.93 after moving as high as 3,751.45.

Among the actives, CapitaLand Integrated Commercial Trust lost 0.52 percent, while CapitaLand Investment fell 0.39 percent, City Developments and Mapletree Logistics Trust sank 0.79 percent, Comfort DelGro rallied 1.39 percent, DBS Group surrendered 1.34 percent, DFI Retail Group stumbled 1.30 percent, Hongkong Land skidded 0.92 percent, Keppel DC REIT slumped 0.93 percent, Keppel Ltd shed 0.74 percent, Mapletree Pan Asia Commercial Trust improved 0.84 percent, Oversea-Chinese Banking Corporation plunged 1.74 percent, SATS eased 0.28 percent, Seatrium Limited plummeted 2.05 percent, SembCorp Industries retreated 1.29 percent, Singapore Technologies Engineering tumbled 1.31 percent, SingTel added 0.65 percent, Thai Beverage dropped 0.90 percent, Wilmar International slid 0.33 percent, Yangzijiang Financial declined 1.25 percent, Yangzijiang Shipbuilding tanked 1.38 percent and Emperador, Genting Singapore, Mapletree Industrial Trust and Frasers Centrepoint Trust were unchanged.

The lead from Wall Street is positive as the major averages opened lower on Friday but quickly bounced up into the green and stayed that way for the balance of the session.

The Dow rallied 498.06 points or 1.18 percent to finish at 42,840.26, while the NASDAQ jumped 199.80 points or 1.03 percent to close at 19,572.60 and the S&P 500 gained 63.77 points or 1.09 percent to end at 5,930.85.

For the week, the Dow plunged 2.3 percent, the S&P 500 tumbled 2.0 percent and the NASDAQ slumped 1.8 percent.

The rally on Wall Street followed the release of the Commerce Department's report on personal consumption expenditures (PCE), which came in slower than expected.

As that is the Federal Reserve's preferred reading on consumer price inflation, the slower than expected growth inspired traders to pick up stocks at reduced levels following the mid-week sell-off.

Oil futures settled higher on Friday as the dollar came off two-year highs after soft PCE readings eased concerns about the outlook for interest rate cuts. West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures perked $0.08 or about 0.1 percent to $69.46 a barrel. Oil futures shed 2.5 percent in the week.

Closer to home, Singapore will release November numbers for consumer prices. In October, overall inflation was down 0.3 percent on month and up 1.4 percent on year, while core CPI rose an annual 2.1 percent.