Singapore shares rise at Wednesday’s open; STI up 0.4%

SINGAPORE stocks opened stronger on Wednesday (Jun 1) even as Wall Street stocks fell overnight.

Singapore’s Straits Times Index (STI) headed up 0.4 per cent or 11.32 points to 3,243.81 as at 9.01 am. Gainers outnumbered losers 65 to 51, after 98.2 million securities worth S$164.6 million changed hands.

The most active counter by volume as at 9.01 am was Sembcorp Marine which fell 1.7 per cent or S$0.002 to S$0.117 with 30.3 million shares changing hands.

Other heavily traded securities included Singtel , which rose 0.8 per cent or S$0.02 to S$2.61 with 6.8 million shares traded, as well as Genting Singapore , which gained 1.3 per cent or S$0.01 to S$0.79 with 4.1 million shares traded.

Banking stocks rose in early morning trade. DBS was up 0.5 per cent or S$0.16 at S$31.10, UOB gained 0.2 per cent or S$0.05 to S$29.56, while OCBC rose 0.3 per cent or S$0.04 to S$11.87.

Other active index counters included Wilmar International , which was trading up 0.7 per cent or S$0.03 at S$4.20, and Ascendas Reit , which fell 0.7 per cent or S$0.02 to S$2.77.

In the US, Wall Street stocks retreated on Tuesday as concerns about inflation, Federal Reserve interest rate hikes and weakening consumer confidence prevented the market from extending last week’s rally.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average dropped 0.7 per cent to end the day at 32,990.12. The broad-based S&P 500 fell 0.6 per cent to 4,132.15, while the tech-rich Nasdaq Composite Index shed 0.4 per cent to close at 12,081.39.

Meanwhile, Eurozone stocks hit session lows on Tuesday after data showed inflation rose to a record high in May, spurring bets of bigger interest rate hikes by the European Central Bank.

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The Stoxx index of eurozone shares dropped 1.3 per cent and the pan-European Stoxx 600 index, flat before the reading, fell 0.7 per cent.

Elsewhere in Asia, Tokyo’s stocks opened higher on Wednesday, shrugging off falls on Wall Street with investors watching for key US data due this week.

The benchmark Nikkei 225 index was up 0.18 per cent, or 49.61 points, at 27,329.41 in early trade, while the broader Topix index was up 0.32 per cent, or 6.19 points, at 1,918.86.