Soft Start Seen For Thai Stock Market

(RTTNews) - The Thai stock market on Monday snapped the three-day winning streak in which it had climbed almost 20 points or 1.6 percent. The Stock Exchange of Thailand now sits just above the 1,285-point plateau and it may tick lower again on Tuesday.

The global forecast for the Asian markets is mixed to lower, with support from the technology shares likely to limit the downside. The European markets were down and the U.S. bourses were mixed and the Asian markets figure to split the difference.

The SET finished modestly lower on Monday following losses from the food, finance, industrial, property, resource and service sectors.

For the day, the index lost 7.97 points or 0.62 percent to finish at the daily low of 1,285.64 after peaking at 1,299.24. Volume was 7.197 billion shares worth 33.100 billion baht. There were 315 decliners and 146 gainers, with 190 stocks finishing unchanged.

Among the actives, Thailand Airport plummeted 4.60 percent, while Asset World dropped 0.89 percent, Banpu declined 1.32 percent, Bangkok Bank fell 0.34 percent, Bangkok Dusit Medical contracted 1.49 percent, Bangkok Expressway slumped 0.94 percent, B. Grimm rallied 1.43 percent, BTS Group weakened 0.65 percent, CP All Public slipped 0.52 percent, Charoen Pokphand Foods shed 0.44 percent, Energy Absolute soared 2.53 percent, Gulf skidded 1.16 percent, Kasikornbank dipped 0.30 percent, Krung Thai Bank and PTT Global Chemical both sank 0.80 percent, PTT Oil & Retail lost 0.71 percent, PTT was down 0.78 percent, SCG Packaging tumbled 2.16 percent, Siam Commercial Bank slid 0.39 percent, Siam Concrete retreated 1.31 percent, Thai Oil tanked 2.78 percent, True Corporation advanced 0.89 percent, TTB Bank stumbled 3.14 percent and Krung Thai Card, Advanced Info and PTT Exploration and Production were unchanged.

The lead from Wall Street is soft as the major averages opened mixed on Monday and ultimately finished on opposite sides of the line and little changed,

The Dow shed 63.31 points or 0.14 percent to finish at 46,694.97, while the NASDAQ gained 161.16 points or 0.71 percent to end at a record 22,941.67 and the S&P 500 rose 24.49 points or 0.36 percent to close at 6,740.49, also a record.

The strength in the markets largely reflected a rally by semiconductor stocks, with the Philadelphia Semiconductor index surging by 2.9 percent to a record closing high.

Significant strength was also visible among gold and software stocks, while housing and commercial real estate stocks moved notably lower over the course of the session.

Meanwhile, traders continued to shrug off concerns about the economic impact of the ongoing government shutdown, which entered its sixth day amid little signs of progress toward a deal on a temporary spending bill.

Crude oil prices surged on Monday as OPEC's output increase for November turned out to be lower than expected and relieved concerns of oversupply. West Texas Intermediate crude for November delivery was up $0.73 or 1.20 percent at $61.61 per barrel.