PSEi tumbles on global economic woes

THE LOCAl stock barometer tumbled back to the 6,600 level on Tuesday – the first trading day of the Lunar Year of the Fire Monkey – as fears of global recession dragged global markets.

The Philippine Stock Exchange index lost 127.7 points or 1.89 percent to close at 6,637.43, tracking sluggish regional markets and the overnight bloodbath in Wall Street.

The decline was led by the cyclical counters – financial and property sub-indices- which both slid by over 2 percent.

The industrial, holding firm and services counters were all up by over 1 percent.

The mining/oil counter – much battered in recent months – rebounded by 7.14 percent due to an extraordinary trade in Lepanto (+48.35 percent).

Trading volume was thin at P3.5 billion. There were 61 advancers which were outnumbered by 119 decliners while 30 stocks were unchanged.

The PSEi was led lower by Megaworld which fell by 4.44 percent while ALI and Metrobank declined by over 3 percent.

URC, JG Summit and DMCI all faltered by over 2 percent while AC, Jollibee, SM Prime, GTCAP, Semirara, PLDT, Globe and RLC all fell by over 1 percent.

MPI and EDC also contributed to the day’s decline.

Outside of the PSEi, gaming stock Melco fell by 9.27 percent.

Meralco bucked the day’s downturn, rising by 0.7 percent.