Stocks pull back

The main local stock barometer pulled back from record highs Friday as many investors pocketed gains from large-cap stocks, particularly telecom giant PLDT.

The main-share Philippine Stock Exchange index gave up 34.28 points or 0.74 percent to finish at 4,613.83. But the main index was still a big winner for the week, having surged a total of 130.47 points or 2.9 percent amid a breakout to new all-time highs in the past three sessions.

The financial and mining/oil counters succumbed most to profit-taking, both declining more than 1 percent. The property sector, a laggard in 2011, was the only counter that bucked the day’s downturn as prospects of low-interest rate rekindled investor interest.

Value turnover amounted to P5.75 billion. There were 61 advancers, which were outnumbered by 101 decliners, while 50 stocks were unchanged.

Index heavyweight PLDT, which has aided the PSEi’s surge to recent highs, fell 1.36 percent to P2,756.

“A big part of the reason why the index was rising was PLDT, so it also had a big contribution in the decline,” said Eric Claudio, strategist at Pentacapital Investments.

Claudio said that as valuations had gone up closer to the last breakout to record highs in August 2011, it was normal to lock up profit while reassessing conditions at this time versus the last peak. He said the index was likely nearing a key resistance level.

He said the previous record high close of 4,550 should be PSEi’s main support. The PSEi peaked at 4,648.11 on Thursday.

Other stocks that weighed down the index the most were Ayala Corp., EDC, BDO, Megaworld, SM Investment, Metrobank, DMCI, Universal Robina, BPI and Semirara.  Second-liners Lepanto, Puregold and PNB also ended lower in heavy trade. Doris C. Dumlao