THE market yesterday bought ahead of an anticipated Friday rise on Wall Street with the Straits Times Index gaining 19.94 points at 3,314.77 thanks mainly to large gains in the Jardine group.

However, even though the index posted a 26-point or 0.8 per cent rise for the week, comments from brokers have not been encouraging, given that movements have constantly come in low volume.

In yesterday's session, 1.56 billion units worth S$964 million were done, a poor haul by local market standards that was roughly half the daily totals last year. Of this, S$484 million or about half came from trading of the 30 STI components.