Business and Economy
PSEi up 0.55%, peso touches 50-level against US dollar
The Philippines’ main equities index posted gains Tuesday while the peso closed slightly lower as the country’s financial markets resume trading after a long holiday. (Photo by Katrina.Tuliao (https://www.tradergroup.org) [CC BY 2.0)
The Philippine Stock Exchange index (PSEi) rose 0.55 percent, or 42.09 points, to 7,703.10 points, which a trader said was backed by positive investors’ risk appetite on Wall Street.
All Shares registered the same increase of 0.55 percent, or 25.37 points, to 4,604.57 points.
Most of the sectors ended the day with gains, led by the Mining and Oil with 3.008 percent.
It was followed by the Property with 1.43 percent expansion as well as the Industrial, Financials, Holding Firms at 0.82 percent, 0.54 percent, and 0.32 percent, respectively.
Services was the lone index that finished the day on the red with 0.52 percent decline.
Total trade volume reached 3.1 billion shares amounting to Php 7.3 billion.
Advancers led decliners at 119 to 84 while 39 shares remained unchanged.
The peso ended the day at 49.99 from 49.95 Thursday last week, which a trader pointed to rising yields of US Treasury and ahead of the Federal Reserve meeting next week.
It opened the day at 50.10, a decline from the 49.85 Thursday last week.
It improved to 49.98 but also moved to 50.11, resulting in an average of 50.04.
Volume for the day reached USD707.55 million, lower than the USD787.9 million in the previous session.
The currency pair is seen to trade between 49.80 and 50.00 Wednesday.
Work in Metro Manila was suspended Friday last week as the country hosted the 30th ASEAN Summit while May 1 is a holiday due to the observance of Labor Day.
