Singapore shares closed higher on Thursday, extending their gains into a third consecutive trading day as investors picked up some remaining bargains following Wall Street's rally overnight.
Better-than-expected quarterly results from JP Morgan and other U.S. companies drove the Dow Jones Industrial Average up by more than 250 points on Wednesday.
'At this time, investors are focusing on earnings for leads,' said Song Seng Wun, research head at CIMB-GK Research.
Merrill Lynch (nyse: MER - news - people ) will announce its first-quarter results later in the day, while Citigroup (nyse: C - news - people ) will announce its earnings on Friday.
The benchmark Straits Times Index rose 38.81 points or 1.3 percent to close at 3,126.30.
Gainers outnumbered decliners 373 to 263, with 944 stocks unchanged.
But trading volume was low at 1.42 billion shares valued at S$1.77 billion, indicating that many market players kept to the sidelines.
'As the bottom appears to be seen for the credit crisis, there may be focus on the moderating growth momentum in the coming months,' said Song.
Singapore's non-oil domestic exports fell 5.9 percent from a year ago, against economists' estimates of an average 0.3 percent drop, reflecting weaker global demand and a stronger Singapore dollar.
'It may give investors some reason to pause to think about the possibility that growth in the coming months may be weaker as a result of uncertainty out there,' said Song.
Although the market widely expects the U.S. economy to slip into recession in the first half of the year, investors continue to worry about uncertainties such as how deep the slump will be and how soon it can recover.
Singapore rigbuilders' shares rose as the surge in crude oil prices raised hopes that orders for oil exploration rigs and production equipment will pick up after a sluggish first quarter.
Crude oil prices were trading near record levels of $115 a barrel on Thursday.
In the year to date, the momentum of new orders 'has been relatively muted versus last year. With client engagements still strong and order momentum slow over the last two quarters, we believe the next six months are likely to see more positive news flow in terms of order wins,' said Pyari Madhava Menon, analyst at Deutsche Bank (nyse: DB - news - people ), in a note to clients.
Keppel Corp (other-otc: KPELY.PK - news - people ) led the market's advance, rising 4.5 percent to S$11.50 while SembCorp Marine jumped 3.8 percent to S$3.86.
Banking shares were also higher, with DBS Group up 0.6 percent at S$19.18, United Overseas Bank (other-otc: UOVEY.PK - news - people ) up 1.3 percent at S$20.46 and Oversea-Chinese Banking Corp up 1.6 percent at S$8.50.
Property stocks gained, with CapitaLand up 3.36 percent at S$6.63, City Developments up 1.7 percent at S$11.84 and Keppel Land up 1.9 percent at S$5.81.
DBS Vickers Securities said it has upgraded its rating on the Singapore property sector to 'overweight' from 'neutral'. But for the next six months the sector is unlikely to have positive catalysts, it said.
MobileOne, the smallest of the three telecommunications companies in Singapore, fell 1.0 percent to S$1.95 on concerns that it may lose its share of the mobile phone market to its rivals once full mobile number portability is allowed in June, analysts said.
'We believe MobileOne is the most vulnerable to losing out in the longer term due to its inability to provide bundled offerings (such as broadband and pay TV services), which ... are becoming more important to buyers of telecom services in Singapore,' said CIMB-GK Research in a note to clients.
MobileOne will release its first-quarter results on Friday.
Meanwhile, Singapore Telecom was steady at S$3.89 while StarHub gained 2.3 percent at S$3.14.
Construction company KSH Holdings was up 15.2 percent at 38 cents after it announced it has won a S$126.8-million deal from Indonesia's Lippo group to build a luxury condominium at Sentosa Cove.
Among other blue chips, Singapore Airlines (other-otc: SGPJF.PK - news - people ) added 0.5 percent to S$15.34 and Singapore Exchange rose 2.1 percent to S$8.11.
Singapore-listed Straits Asia Resources Ltd. (SAR), an Indonesian coal producer, climbed 2.1 percent to S$2.98 after its parent Australian Straits Resources Ltd. (SRL) proposed to spin off all its coal assets into an entirely separate operation that can seek a secondary listing in Australia.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment