Singapore stocks: STI resumes Tuesday afternoon down 0.6% on day

SINGAPORE equities resumed trading on Tuesday afternoon in negative territory ahead of the Budget reading, with the Straits Times Index (STI) trading 18.62 points or 0.6 per cent lower at 3,194.38 at 1.05pm.

Sentiment among investors is being weighed down by the Covid-19 outbreak and Apple's lower profit guidance for the January-March quarter.

Shortly after the afternoon session commenced, volume traded on the Singapore bourse clocked in at 675.1 million securities with a total turnover of S$416.7 million. Both volume and turnover are on track to miss their respective 2019 intraday averages.

Across the market, decliners outpaced advancers 193 to 129. The bluechip index had eight of the 30 counters in trading in the red.

Genting Singapore was the STI's most active counter, trading flat at 88.5 Singapore cents on 10.2 million shares changing hands.

Singtel was another active. Shares in Singapore's largest telco fell S$0.03 or 0.9 per cent to S$3.18.

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Last Thursday, Singapore's largest telco posted a 23.8 per cent decline in Q3 net profit to S$627.2 million. Since earnings were released, Singtel shares have fallen 5.7 per cent.

Financials continued their downtrend. DBS shares dipped S$0.14 or 0.6 per cent to S$25.34, OCBC Bank fell S$0.06 or 0.6 per cent to S$10.95 and United Overseas Bank traded at S$25.91, down S$0.14 or 0.5 per cent as at 1.06pm.

Among property trusts, Eagle Hospitality Trust (EHT) dipped US$0.01 or 1.9 per cent to US$0.52. On Tuesday morning, EHT posted a Q4 distribution per stapled security of 1.179 US cents, 24.4 per cent below its intial public offering forecast.

Elsewhere in the Asia-Pacific, benchmarks in Australia, China, Hong Kong, Japan, Malaysia, South Korea, Taiwan and Malaysia were lower.