Thai Stock Market Tipped To Open In The Red

Ahead of Tuesday’s holiday for the king’s birthday, the Thai stock market had moved higher in two straight sessions, collecting just 3 points or 0.2 percent along the way. The Stock Exchange of Thailand now sits just above the 1,380-point plateau although it’s looking at a soft start on Wednesday.

The global forecast for the Asian markets offers little clarity ahead of key U.S. employment data later this week. The European and U.S. markets were mixed and little changed and the Asian bourses figure to follow suit.

The SET finished slightly higher on Monday following mild gains from the food, finance, industrial, resource and service sectors.

For the day, the index rose 3.23 points or 0.23 percent to finish at 1,383.54 after trading between 1,374.60 and 1,389.49. Volume was 10.880 billion shares worth 35.529 billion baht. There were 233 decliners and 224 gainers, with 194 stocks finishing unchanged.

Among the actives, Advanced Info gained 0.91 percent, while Thailand Airport surged 2.56 percent, Asset World skidded 1.08 percent, Banpu lost 0.67 percent, Bangkok Dusit Medical soared 1.94 percent, Bangkok Expressway gathered 1.27 percent, B. Grimm rallied 1.96 percent, BTS Group was up 0.70 percent, Charoen Pokphand Foods climbed 1.05 percent, Energy Absolute stumbled 1.10 percent, Gulf rose 0.55 percent, Kasikornbank fell 0.39 percent, Krung Thai Bank jumped 1.65 percent, Krung Thai Card spiked 2.16 percent, PTT Oil & Retail increased 0.50 percent, PTT strengthened 1.42 percent, PTT Exploration and Production tanked 2.02 percent, PTT Global Chemical added 0.65 percent, SCG Packaging shed 0.64 percent, Siam Commercial Bank collected 0.75 percent, Siam Concrete accelerated 2.08 percent, Thai Oil improved 0.49 percent, True Corporation advanced 0.90 percent and TTB Bank, Bangkok Bank and CP All Public were unchanged.

The lead from Wall Street is again inconsistent as the major averages opened lower on Tuesday. The NASDAQ quickly broke into the green and ended positive, but the Dow and S&P stayed in the red.

The Dow shed 79.88 points or 0.22 percent to finish at 36,124.56, while the NASDAQ gained 44.42 points or 0.31 percent to close at 14,229.91 and the S&P 500 fell 2.60 points or 0.06 percent to end at 4,567.18.

The initial weakness on Wall Street came as traders continued to cash in on recent strength in the markets amid concerns optimism about the outlook for interest rates has led to overbought conditions.

While the Federal Reserve is widely expected to leave interest rates unchanged in the coming months, traders may need more evidence to solidify hopes of a rate cut in the near future.

The subsequent rebound came as a Labor Department report may have reinforced those hopes, showing a bigger than expected decrease in U.S. job openings in October.

Oil prices dropped on Tuesday for a fourth straight session, on lingering concerns about the outlook for demand and on disappointment over the small size of additional output cuts announced by OPEC. West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures for January ended down $0.72 or 1 percent at $72.32 a barrel.

Closer to home, Thailand will see November data for consumer prices later today; in October, overall inflation was down 0.31 percent on year, while core CPI rose an annual 0.66 percent.