Mixed session as Jardine stable weighs STI down

THERE is a growing feeling among market watchers that the Straits Times Index's (STI) best days for 2017 came in the first half of the year and that for the remaining three months, a slow downward drift is all that can be expected.

This view has formed over the past few weeks as the STI traded within a tight band, relatively immune to Wall Street's consecutive all-time highs though reacting to the downside whenever North Korea launched a missile test.

On Thursday, the index again failed to react positively to yet another all-time US high which came after the Federal Reserve left interest rates unchanged and announced a relatively tame programme to unwind its bloated balance sheet.