Singapore stocks pull back at open as export growth cools; STI down 0.2%

SINGAPORE shares opened slightly weaker on Friday, following a mixed performance on Wall Street and muted data on the Republic's export growth.

Key Singapore exports grew for the ninth straight month in August but came in well under analysts' forecasts, as non-electronics shipments shrank year on year.

Trade agency Enterprise Singapore attributed the muted growth to a year-ago high base, with non-oil domestic exports dragged down by a decline in non-electronic shipments, despite the continued expansion in Singapore's linchpin electronics cluster.

The Straits Times Index (STI) slipped 0.2 per cent or 7.29 points to 3,057.25 as at 9.02am. Losers slightly outnumbered gainers 69 to 60, after 96.8 million securities worth S$76.9 million changed hands.

The most active counter by volume was Hatten Land PH0 , which jumped 30 per cent or 1.8 Singapore cents to 7.8 cents, with 29.7 million shares traded as at 9.03am.

Other heavily traded securities include Sembcorp Marine S51, which held steady at 8.3 Singapore cents, with 15 million shares traded, and CapitaLand Integrated Commercial Trust C38U , which fell 0.5 per cent or S$0.01 to S$2.01, with 3.2 million units traded.

Banking stocks were mixed in early trade. DBS D05 was down 0.4 per cent or S$0.13 to S$29.95, while OCBC O39 lost 0.3 per cent or S$0.03 to S$11.57. UOB U11 however, gained 0.4 per cent or S$0.11 to S$25.67 as at 9.03am.

Other active index counters include Singtel Z74, which was flat at S$2.40, and Singapore Airlines C6L , which dropped 1.6 per cent or S$0.08 to S$4.84.

The national carrier on Thursday said it has exhausted the S$8.8 billion in gross proceeds raised from its rights issue in June last year, with the last S$0.6 billion having been used for aircraft and aircraft-related payments between July 1 and Sept 1.

In the US, the Dow Jones Industrial Average fell 0.2 per cent to 34,751.32, the broad-based S&P 500 lost 0.2 per cent to 4,473.75, while the tech-rich Nasdaq Composite edged up 0.1 per cent to 15,181.92.

European stocks rose on Thursday as travel counters snapped a four-day losing streak. The pan-European Stoxx 600 index climbed 0.4 per cent, bouncing off a six-week closing low hit in the previous session.

Elsewhere in Asia, Tokyo stocks opened higher on Friday, with investors keeping an eye on Japanese politics as campaigning in the ruling party's leadership race kicks off.

The benchmark Nikkei 225 index climbed 0.3 per cent to 30,425.98 in early trade, while the broader Topix index edged up 0.1 per cent to 2,091.18.