Singapore shares buckle under regional selling pressure; STI falls 0.17%

THE Singapore bourse, which for a while had a shot at being an outlier in a sea of red that swept across regional bourses, buckled under selling pressure near the close and snapped 3 straight days of gains.

The key Straits Times Index closed 5.34 points or 0.17 per cent lower at 3,134.87 on Wednesday (Jun 29), after holding above water for much of the trading day, underscoring the fragile trading sentiments in a climate gripped with inflation and recession woes.

Key gauges from Japan, China, Taiwan, Malaysia and Australia posted losses, with Hong Kong and South Korea falling the most —by 1.8 per cent.

Fixation over slowing growth and cripplingly high energy and food prices persisted, following recently-released weak data out of the US, namely the consumer confidence data and a monthly gauge on factory activity in the mid-Atlantic states. This sparked a selloff in Wall Street overnight. Amid a low risk trading appetite, news that China has cut quarantine times for inbound travellers by half — its biggest shift so far amid protracted restrictions — failed to help perk up market sentiments.

Traders will be closely watching a final reading of the US Q1 GDP data, which most expect to remain unchanged from an earlier estimate of a 1.5 per cent annual decline.

On the home front, some 1.16 billion securities worth S$1.27 billion were traded. Losers outpaced gainers, with 285 counters down and 197 up. DBS, Venture Corp, Singapore Exchange and Wilmar International led the day’s losses.

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Catalist-listed Nippecraft called for a trading halt pending an explanation after it was shot an “unusual volume movements” query by the Singapore Exchange. Shares of the stationery company jumped nearly 27 per cent or S$0.011 to S$0.052, with 15 million shares traded when the halt kicked in on Wednesday morning. : N32 0%

Rex International : 5WH 0%said in the morning that its 92-per cent owned subsidiary Lime Petroleum’s US$97 million 3-year senior secured bond issue was fully subscribed. The funds will be used to refinance existing senior secured bonds, for acquisitions on the Norwegian Continental Shelf and general working capital purposes. Shares of the pure oil play slipped S$0.005 or 1.75 per cent to S$0.28.

Nanofilm Technologies International : MZH 0% snagged a “buy” rating from DBS Group Research, with a new target price of S$3.70 on the back of optimism that the group is well positioned for growth, given its multiple growth engines. The house also cited recovery in supply-chain disruptions and decent earnings growth for the positive ratings.  The counter slipped S$0.020 or 0.84 per cent to S$2.37.