Singapore stocks fall at Monday’s open; STI down 0.9%

SINGAPORE shares opened lower on Monday (Apr 15), tracking losses in the US market amid worries over tension and conflict in the Middle East.

As at 9.01 am, the Straits Times Index (STI) fell 30.02 points or 0.9 per cent to 3,186.89. Across the broader market, losers outnumbered gainers 132 to 22 after 69.5 million securities worth S$95.7 million changed hands. 

Seatrium was the most heavily traded counter by volume. The counter remained unchanged at S$0.081, after 7.8 million securities were transacted. 

Other counters that were briskly traded included Singtel, which was down 0.8 per cent or S$0.02 at S$2.35, after 6.7 million shares changed hands, and Thai Beverage, which lost 2 per cent or S$0.01 to S$0.48, after 5.3 million securities were exchanged.

Banking stocks declined in early morning trade. DBS fell 1.1 per cent or S$0.40 to S$35.72, while OCBC slid 0.9 per cent or S$0.12 to S$13.65. UOB also declined 0.7 per cent or S$0.22 to S$29.35. 

Over on Wall Street, stocks finished in the red on Friday, following a rocky week and concerns over political escalation of conflict in the Middle East. The tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite Index shed 1.6 per cent to 16,175.09, and the broad-based S&P 500 retreated 1.5 per cent to 5,123.41. The Dow Jones Industrial Average also sank 1.2 per cent to 37,983.24.

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In Europe, shares closed largely flat on Friday, as rising geopolitical tensions gnawed at investor optimism around the European Central Bank’s indication of potential rate cuts. The pan-European Stoxx 600 eked out a gain of 0.1 per cent to close at 505.25.