Singapore shares rise at open tracking Wall Street gains; STI up 0.2%

SINGAPORE stocks opened higher on Wednesday tracking rallies on Wall Street and the Tokyo markets.

Singapore's Straits Times Index (STI) rose 0.2 per cent or 4.21 points to 2,542.76 as at 9.05am.

Gainers outnumbered losers 115 to 43 after 180.8 million securities worth S$44.5 million changed hands.

The most active counter by volume was Oceanus, which held steady at 0.7 Singapore cent with 91.9 million shares changing hands. The company announced late on Tuesday that it had appointed former minister Yaacob Ibrahim as an independent director.

Other heavily traded securities included CNMC Goldmine which fell 3.3 per cent or one Singapore cent to 29.5 cents with 3.5 million shares traded, as well as Genting Singapore which rose 1.5 per cent or S$0.01 to S$0.70, with 2.3 million shares traded.

Banking stocks were mixed in early morning trade. DBS was trading up 0.4 per cent or S$0.09 to S$20.96, UOB advanced 0.3 per cent or S$0.05 to S$19.66, while OCBC was down 0.1 per cent or S$0.01 to S$8.67.

Other active index counters included Singtel which was down 0.4 per cent or S$0.01 to S$2.29 and Yangzijiang Shipbuilding which rose 1.6 per cent or 1.5 Singapore cents to 94.5 cents.

On Wall Street, stocks finished at fresh records on Tuesday as data showed improving US manufacturing trends. The Nasdaq Composite Index jumped 1.4 per cent to 11,939.67 to post a third straight record. The S&P 500 also finished at a record, winning 0.8 per cent to 3,526.65, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average gained 0.8 per cent to end at 28,645.66.

Elsewhere in Asia, Tokyo stocks opened higher on Wednesday, tracking rallies on Wall Street. The benchmark Nikkei 225 index was up 0.5 per cent to 23,248.17 in early trade, while the Topix index edged up 0.3 per cent to 1,620.42.