Philippine stocks flat, ignore both good and bad news

Philippine share prices barely moved on Tuesday, shrugging off both good and bad news — Wall Street's overnight climb to a new high and increasing joblessness among Filipinos. The benchmark 30-company Philippine Stock Exchange index added 0.15 percent or 4.47 points or to close at 3,046.57, while the all-shares index gained 0.12 percent or 2.34 points to 1,896.5. "Second- and third-liners continued to dominate trading as we get closer to the holidays and less trading activity is seen," said Prince Anthony Yeung of AB Capital Securities. Four of the six subindices closed higher, led by mining and oil, which went up by 2.66 percent. Service and property stocks, on the other hand, slid by 0.76 percent and and 0.31 percent, respectively. Losers narrowly beat gainers 49 to 46, while 61 stocks were unchanged. Volume reached 4.78 billion stocks worth P2.55 billion. On Monday night, the Dow Jones industrial average rose by 30 points to end at 10,501.55. In Asia, bourses were mixed. As of mid-session, Japan, Shanghai, and Hong Kong stock markets were declining, while Singapore, Seoul and Australia were posting modest gains. In the local news, the National Statistics Office reported that the Philippine jobless rate worsened to 7.1 % as of end-October to 2.72 million from 2.53 million a year earlier. During Tuesday's trading, dominant carrier Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co. was the day’s top trade, cornering 8.21 percent of the total trading value. Its shares dipped by 0.95 perdent P25 or to P2,615 each. Miner Century Peak Metal Holdings Corp. rose by 1.49 or 10 centavos to P6.80, while alternative power producer Energy Development Corp. was steady at P4.30. NiHao Mineral Resources International, Inc., another mining firm, slid by 1.12 percent or five centavos to P4.40, while property giant Ayala Land, Inc. was flat at P11.50. "Thin trading focused on nonindex issues are expected to persist in the coming days. Investors and traders are starting to slow down due to lack of leads and the upcoming holidays," Yeung said. — Cheryl M. Arcibal, GMANews.TV