FTSE STI closed 1,794.20, down 7.71 points or 0.43% with a total volume of 1.6b and a total value of S$1.47b. Total number of advance vs decline was 293 vs 196. Of the 30 component stocks, 15 closed in the positive, 12 closed down and 3 remained unchanged. The top 5 gainer component stocks were :-
1. JMH 400US$ +1.080
2. JSH 500US$ +0.580
3. SIA +0.300
4. HKLand US$ +0.190
5. Noble Grp +0.180
The top 5 loser component stocks were :-
1. UOB -0.620
2. DBS -0.480
3. CityDev -0.350
4. OCBC -0.250
5. SGX -0.210
Even though US markets closed up the night before, Asia bourses were mostly open down in the morning. STI managed to open up but profit taking kicked in and sending the index into negative region soon. Nikkei was pretty flattish until news that BOJ only cut rate by 0.2% instead of 0.25% as most expected drove the Nikkei index to close 5% down. The sentiment coupled with UOB 3Q result missing expectation soon caused the rest of the Asia bourses to trade in the negative region. STI managed to close flattish probably due to month end window dressing. However, the 3 local banks all closed in the negative region. Next week OCBC and DBS will be reporting their 3Q result and with UOB missing out on market expectation, the other 2 might follow the same steps too.
