Singapore stocks: STI resumes Friday afternoon down 0.88% on day

SINGAPORE shares resumed trading in negative territory on Friday, with the Straits Times Index retreating 28.38 points, or 0.88 per cent to 3,203.17 as at 1.01pm.

Decliners outnumbered gainers 222 to 119, after about 628.8 million securities worth S$465.2 million changed hands.

Medtecs International was the most heavily traded, rising 1.7 Singapore cents, or 22.4 per cent to 9.3 Singapore cents, with 85.2 million shares traded, while Rex International slipped 0.7 Singapore cent, or 3.9 per cent to S$0.171, with 21.9 million shares traded.

Banking stocks also faltered by the afternoon trade. DBS lost S$0.18, or 0.7 per cent to S$25.52, United Overseas Bank retreated S$0.27, or 1 per cent to S$26.06, and OCBC Bank fell S$0.12, or 1.1 per cent to S$10.95.

Meanwhile, Sembcorp Industries sank S$0.10, or 4.6 per cent to S$2.06, after the conglomerate on Thursday night flagged losses for its energy division, and impairments of S$245 million for its fiscal fourth quarter.

Mapletree Logistics Trust was also down, shedding S$0.04, or 2.1 per cent to S$1.87.

Elsewhere in the Asia-Pacific region, Japan's Topix dropped 0.4 per cent, and South Korea's Kospi fell 1.2 per cent.

China's Shanghai Composite was down 0.6 per cent, and Hong Kong's Hang Seng shed 0.8 per cent, while Australian stocks declined 0.6 per cent.