Singapore stocks open higher on Wednesday; STI up 0.6%

SINGAPORE shares opened higher on Wednesday boosted by gains from banks. Overnight, Wall Street ended mostly flat after stocks bounced back from sharp early losses.

On the Singapore bourse, the Straits Times Index (STI) gained 0.6 per cent or 17.63 points to 2,908.33 as at 9.03am.

Gainers outnumbered losers 97 to 48, after 164.8 million securities worth S$139.5 million changed hands.

The most active counter by volume was Jiutian Chemical, which fell 7.5 per cent or 0.8 Singapore cent to 9.9 cents, with 69.6 million shares changing hands.

Other heavily traded securities include Thomson Medical, which rose 0.9 per cent or 0.1 Singapore cent to 11.2 cents, with 7.7 million shares traded, and Singtel, which was up 0.4 per cent or S$0.01 to S$2.37.

Banking stocks rose in early trade. DBS gained 2.2 per cent or S$0.57 to S$26.23, UOB rose 0.8 per cent or S$0.19 to S$23.79, while OCBC advanced 0.6 per cent or S$0.06 to S$10.69.

OCBC on Wednesday posted a 9 per cent drop in its fourth-quarter net profit to S$1.13 billion.

Other active index counters include Singapore Airlines, which was up 0.9 per cent or S$0.04 to S$4.69, and CapitaLand, which was flat at S$3.12. The property giant on Wednesday posted a net loss of S$1.67 billion for its second half ended Dec 31, 2020, sinking into the red from a net profit of S$1.2 billion a year ago, mainly due to revaluation losses and impairments.

In the US, Tuesday's session ended largely stable after Federal Reserve chairman Jerome Powell pledged to keep interest rates low until inflation rises consistently.

Markets have become jittery about the prospects that the pandemic recovery - fuelled by the US$1.9 trillion economic stimulus package making its way through Congress - will ignite inflation, leading to rising lending rates.

The benchmark Dow Jones Industrial Average inched up 0.1 per cent to end at 31,537.35, while the broad-based S&P 500 rose 0.1 per cent to finish at 3,881.37. However, the tech-rich Nasdaq Composite Index lost 0.5 per cent to 13,465.20.

Elsewhere in Asia, Tokyo stocks opened lower on Wednesday amid inflation fears as a recent rise in yields of US Treasury bonds weighed on high-tech shares. The Nikkei 225 index slipped 0.4 per cent to 30,027.42 in early trade, while the broader Topix index declined 0.3 per cent to 1,932.67.