Singapore Bourse Poised To Halt Its Slide

The Singapore stock market has finished lower in two straight sessions, slipping almost 20 points or 0.6 percent in that span. The Straits Times Index now sits just beneath the 3,740-point plateau although it’s due for support on Friday.

The global forecast for the Asian markets is upbeat on solid earnings news and support from crude oil. The European and U.S. markets finished higher and the Asian bourses are expected to continue that trend.

The STI finished slightly lower on Thursday following losses from the property stocks and industrials, while the financial sector was mixed.

For the day, the index fell 4.42 points or 0.12 percent to finish at 3,739.22 after trading between 3,736.16 and 3,751.25.

Among the actives, CapitaLand Integrated Commercial Trust lost 0.52 percent, while CapitaLand Investment tanked 1.41 percent, City Developments dipped 0.19 percent, DBS Group collected 0.83 percent, Genting Singapore plunged 1.94 percent, Keppel DC REIT tumbled 1.32 percent, Keppel Ltd slumped 1.05 percent, Mapletree Pan Asia Commercial Trust shed 0.81 percent, Mapletree Logistics Trust added 0.80 percent, Oversea-Chinese Banking Corporation fell 0.30 percent, Seatrium Limited skidded 1.04 percent, SembCorp Industries declined 1.13 percent, Singapore Technologies Engineering advanced 0.88 percent, SingTel plummeted 2.24 percent, Thai Beverage sank 0.96 percent, Wilmar International dropped 0.97 percent, Yangzijiang Financial retreated 1.23 percent, Yangzijiang Shipbuilding gained 0.75 percent and Hongkong Land, Mapletree Industrial Trust, Emperador, Comfort DelGro, SATS and DFI Retail were unchanged.

The lead from Wall Street is positive as the major averages opened slightly lower on Thursday but gradually moved higher and finished in the green.

The Dow rallied 461.88 points or 1.06 percent to finish at 43,870.35, while the NASDAQ rose 6.28 points or 0.03 percent to close at 18,972.42 and the S&P 500 advanced 31.60 points or 0.53 percent to end at 5,948.71.

The sharp increase by the Dow came amid strong gains by IBM Corp. (IBM), Sherwin-Williams (SHW) and Salesforce (CRM).

The NASDAQ showed a lack of direction as traders tracked the performance of AI darling Nvidia (NVDA), which reported better than expected third quarter earnings and revenues – but some traders expressed concerns about slowing revenue growth.

In U.S. economic news, the Labor Department said initial jobless claims unexpectedly fell to their lowest level in over six months last week. Also, the Conference Board’ leading economic index fell more than expected in October

Oil prices climbed higher Thursday as escalating geopolitical tensions due to the ongoing war between Russia and Ukraine outweighed recent data showing robust supply in the market. West Texas Intermediate crude oil futures for December closed up $1.35 or 1.96 percent at $70.10 a barrel.

Closer to home, Singapore will release Q3 numbers for gross domestic product later this morning; in the previous three months, GDP was up 4.1 percent on year.