Stocks down on US rate hike fears

The local stock market slipped yesterday as US Federal Reserve interest rate jitters weighed down regional markets.

The Philippine Stock Exchange index (PSEi) lost 25.53 points or 0.35 percent to close at 7,334.52 in mixed trade. Across the region, markets traded with caution ahead of speeches by US Federal Reserve officials this week. Last week, some Fed officials have made pronouncements that interest rates may rise as early as April.

At the local market, the day’s decline was led by the mining/oil counter, which slipped by 1.23 percent. The financial, services and property counters also declined.

On the other hand, the industrial and holding firm counters made modest gains.

Value turnover for the day amounted to P5.11 billion.  Despite the PSEi’s decline, market breadth was positive as there were 107 advancers that beat 92 decliners while 44 stocks were unchanged.

Petron tumbled by 3.28 percent while Ayala Land and SM Investments—-the two most actively traded stocks—both declined by more than 2 percent.

BDO Unibank and PLDT both slipped by over 1 percent while Metrobank, Universal Robina Corp. and Metro Pacific Investments Corp. all declined.

First Gen bucked the day’s downturn, rising by 2.39 percent, while Ayala Corp. and Globe Telecom also gained more than 1 percent.  SM Prime, GT Capital and Megaworld all faltered. Doris Dumlao-Abadilla