Bourse glitch pushed aside, investors focus on GDP bets

Stocks closed higher on Wednesday as investors brushed off an early-morning technical glitch at the exchange and positioned ahead of the release of the gross domestic product (GDP) data on Thursday.

By the closing bell, the benchmark Philippine Stock Exchange index (PSEi) rose 0.57 percent, or 39.86 points, to 7,081.36 while the broader All Shares index added 0.44 percent, or 16.28 points, to 3,702.76.

The Philippine government is expecting the economy to have grown by 6.5 percent to 7.5 percent in 2022. ING Bank forecasts an even faster growth at 7.7 percent while Asean+3 Macroeconomic Research Office said the Philippines likely expanded by 7.3 percent last year.

Stocks gained despite a technical problem that delayed the opening of trading by 38 minutes on Wednesday.

Philippine Stock Exchange president Ramon Monzon said this was due to an “issue” with their good-till-cancelled system, which books stock market orders until removed by the client. This is different from day orders, which expire at the end of each session.

Monzon said the issue was resolved “quickly” and trading started at 10:08 a.m.

A total of 1.86 billion shares valued at P5.75 billion changed hands while foreigners were net buyers of an amount totaling P237.3 million.

Services took the lead on Wednesday, followed by holding firms, property, financial and industrial stocks. Mining and oil was the sole losing subsector.

International Container Terminal Services Inc. was the top traded stock as it rose 2.17 percent to P216 per share.

Overall, there were 100 advancers against 89 decliners while 48 companies closed unchanged.