Singapore shares track equity markets gains in Wall Street, Europe

Singapore stocks rose with most key bourses in Asia-Pacific on Friday (Jan 19), taking their cue from the better showing in global equity markets overnight.

The Straits Times Index was up 12.51 points or 0.4 per cent to 3,152.29 points for the day, but was 1.2 per cent lower for the week.

Key regional indices mostly ended higher on Friday, but not those in mainland China and Hong Kong after the People’s Bank of China announced its decision not to cut interest rates.

Traders checked out the sectors that saw the heaviest drops since the beginning of the year, leading to global equity markets posting gains overnight, private bank LGT wrote in a note on Friday.

Any comments from international policymakers speaking at the last day of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, could provide further impulses, said LGT.

Property developer and hotel operator Hotel Properties Limited’s : H15 0% (HPL) shares slid S$0.02 or 0.6 per cent to S$3.59 on Friday. This comes a day after the Attorney-General’s Chambers said it would make a decision on the investigation against HPL managing director Ong Beng Seng at the conclusion of the court case against former transport minister S Iswaran.

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Iswaran had allegedly obtained from Ong over S$300,000 worth of tickets, hotel stays and flights.

After GuocoLand : F17 0%emerged as : F17 0%a : F17 0%part of a consortium that was the sole bidder on Thursday for a site for residential and commercial development in Marina South at a bid price significantly below market expectations, its shares closed unchanged on Friday at S$1.44 amid expectations that the site would not be awarded.

Decliners beat gainers 279 to 254 across the broader market, with 1.2 billion securities transacting at a total value of S$944.9 million.