(RTTNews.com) – The Singapore stock market on Friday wrote a finish to the two-day winning streak in which it had spiked almost 65 points or 2 percent. The Straits Times Index ended just below the 3,340-point plateau, and the market may take further damage on Monday.
The global forecast for the Asian markets is broadly negative, thanks to soft employment data from the United States plus uneasiness over recent terrorist activities in France. The European and U.S. markets ended lower and the Asian markets are expected to follow that lead.
The STI finished slightly lower on Friday following weakness from the telecoms and industrials, while the financials and properties were mixed.
For the day, the index fell 6.67 points or 0.20 percent to finish at 3,338.44 after trading between 3,328.96 and 3,372.34. Volume was 1.34 billion shares worth 1.25 billion Singapore dollars.
Among the actives, Keppel Corp shed 1.18 percent, while CapitaLand dropped 1.22 percent, Hongkong Land jumped 1.93 percent, Golden Agri-Resources lost 1.08 percent, Wilmar International added 0.31 percent, United Overseas Bank tumbled 2.66 percent, DBS Group collected 0.25 percent, Oversea-Chinese Banking Corporation fell 0.76 percent, SembCorp declined 1.64 percent and SingTel retreated 1.27 percent.
The lead from Wall Street is soft as stocks ended lower on Friday, partly offsetting the gains in the two previous sessions.
The Dow fell 170.50 points or 1 percent to 17,737.37, while the NASDAQ lost 32.12 points or 0.7 percent to 4,704.07 and the S&P 500 slid 17.33 points or 0.8 percent to 2,044.81. For the week, the S&P 500 dropped 0.7 percent, while the Dow and the NASDAQ both fell 0.5 percent.
The weakness reflected a negative reaction to the Labor Department’s monthly jobs report. While a bigger than expected increase in employment contributed to a drop in the unemployment rate, the report also showed a slowdown in wage growth.
The mixed data led to some uncertainty about the outlook for monetary policy, leading some traders to cash in on the recent gains.
Negative sentiment was also generated by a pullback by the price of crude oil, which moved back to the downside after closing higher for two straight days.
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