PH shares start week with slight uptick

The local stock barometer ended slightly higher in thin trading on Monday as investors lacked incentives to participate in the market in a big way.

The main-share Philippine Stock Exchange index (PSEi) added 5.9 points or 0.08 percent to close at 7,891.13 on selected buying of large-cap stocks.

Value turnover was extraordinarily low at P3.35 billion, compared to the usual daily turnover of P5 billion.

Market breadth was also negative as 98 decliners outnumbered 86 advancers, while 59 stocks were unchanged.

Local stock brokerage Papa Securities was expecting a quiet opening this week “on a lack of catalysts, both local and external, as earnings season starts to kick off and dictates the overall market movement.”

The brokerage noted that the Dow and S&P had both closed in the red last Friday while the earnings season and issues regarding Brexit continued to be in the spotlight.

Papa Securities said the 7,900 to 8,000 level remained a “tough level to beat given a lack of strong internal catalysts and the constant net foreign selling we’ve been seeing.”

On Monday, there was a modest net foreign selling of P2.97 million.

The PSEi was supported by BDO, which gained by 2.27 percent ahead of its third quarter earnings report. URC also surged by nearly 2 percent.

ICTSI, Metro Pacific and AGI all added over 1 percent.

Ayala Corp., SM Investments and BPI also inched up.

On the other hand, SM Prime, DMCI, JG Summit and Jollibee all declined by over 1 percent.