STI starts week with 26.11-point drop

WEAKNESS in Hong Kong and in the Dow futures meant the Straits Times Index started the week off with a 26.11-point loss at 2,880.69 on Monday, led mainly by the banks. In the second line, the stunning 80 per cent crash in the shares of property developer OKH Global grabbed most of the attention, coming as it did on volume of 247.4 million, making it the session's most active counter.

Overall volume came in at 1.5 billion units worth S$1.04 billion, down sharply from Friday's S$1.7 billion. Excluding warrants, there were 149 rises versus 253 falls.

At the start of Monday's trading, the STI had bounced 368 points, or 14 per cent, in about five weeks, thanks to aggressive interest rate cuts in Japan, China, Europe and an announcement by the US Federal Reserve last week that it was keeping rates unchanged because of economic uncertainties.