Stocks mixed as O&M sector gets respite

WALL Street's avoidance of an eighth straight loss on Wednesday helped bring some stability on the Singapore bourse on Thursday via short-covering that lifted the Straits Times Index by 4.38 points to 2,831.96. Bounces in Singtel, Singapore Exchange (SGX) and SPH contributed to this gain, on a day when the advance-decline score excluding warrants was 219 to 175, indicating a more mixed session than the index's reading would suggest.

There was little indication in the futures market as to how Wall Street would trade on Thursday, with the Dow futures edging slightly higher but the S&P 500 futures falling marginally. Europe's positive opening in the late afternoon shed little additional light as most of the markets there had also come under selling pressure in recent days.

Noble Group topped the active stocks list when it rebounded from several days of selling, gaining S$0.013 or almost 10 per cent at S$0.145 on volume of about 400 million.