Spotlight on tapering and penny resurgence

THE United States Federal Reserve's surprise decision to start tapering its QE3 bond-buying programme was the main feature of the week just past as it led to a "relief rally" on Wall Street which pushed the major US indices to new all-time highs.

The response in Asia was tepid - Hong Kong and China stocks fell, while the Straits Times Index hardly budged on Thursday.

In yesterday's session, a possible early window dressing-led rebound in index heavyweights SingTel and the banks helped add 24.25 points to the index at 3,094.48…