Singapore shares jump at Friday’s open; STI up 1.4%

SINGAPORE stocks rose in early trade on Friday (May 13), in contrast to key regional markets which continued to stay in the red.

Singapore’s Straits Times Index surged 1.4 per cent or 45.42 points to 3,210.60 as at 9.07 am. Gainers outnumbered losers 129 to 48, after 107.2 million securities worth S$160.4 million changed hands.

The most active counter by volume as at 9.01 am was Singapore Telecommunications, which rose 0.7 per cent or S$0.02 to S$2.83, with 5.1 million shares changing hands.

Other heavily traded securities included Mapletree Commercial Trust, which rose 1.7 per cent or S$0.03 to S$1.76 with 3.4 million units traded, as well as CapitaLand Integrated Commercial Trust, which rose 3.2 per cent or S$0.07 to S$2.27 with 2.3 million units traded.

Meanwhile, banking stocks rose in early morning trade. DBS was up 1.1 per cent or S$0.33 at S$31.39, UOB gained 1 per cent or S$0.27 to S$28.35, while OCBC rose 1.1 per cent or S$0.13 to S$11.83.

Other active index counters included Ascendas Reit which rose 1.1 per cent or S$0.03 to S$2.71 and Keppel Corp which was up 1.2 per cent or S$0.08 to S$6.51.

In the US, Wall Street stocks on Thursday concluded another volatile round of trading with 2 of the 3 indices in the red.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average finished lower for the sixth straight session at 31,730.30, recovering about 500 points from its low for the session, but still 0.3 per cent below Wednesday's close.

The broad-based S&P 500 shed 0.1 per cent to end at 3,930.08, while the tech-rich Nasdaq Composite Index climbed 0.1 per cent to 11,370.96.

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Stocks to watch: ST Engineering, Genting, First Resources, OUE C-Reit, SingPost

Meanwhile in Europe, stocks slumped on Thursday, with most cyclical parts of the market coming back down, a day after US inflation data fuelled worries about the impact of rising interest rates on economic growth.

The continent-wide Stoxx 600 index slid 0.8 per cent, reversing much of the mid-week gains.

Elsewhere in Asia, Tokyo’s stocks opened lower on Friday, after a mixed close on Wall Street, as investors remained concerned about growth due to stubborn inflation and rising interest rates.

The benchmark Nikkei 225 index was up 0.7 per cent or 173.55 points at 25,922.27 in early trade, while the broader Topix index edged up 0.4 per cent or 7.24 points to 1,836.42.