More foreign fund flows boost peso, PSEi

Risk-on sentiment returned to the Philippines’ financial markets Monday and enabled both the peso and the Philippine Stock Exchange index (PSEi) to stay up. (PIXABAY PHOTO)

MANILA —  Risk-on sentiment returned to the Philippines’ financial markets Monday and enabled both the peso and the Philippine Stock Exchange index (PSEi) to stay up.

The local unit finished the week’s first trading session at 51.86 from 51.89 Friday last week.

A trader pointed this to drop in US Treasury yields, which disadvantaged the greenback.

Higher foreign fund flows in the local equities market also boosted the local curency, the trader said.

For the day, the unit opened better at 51.80 against its 52.00 start in the previous session.

It was able to improve to 51.75 but was also pulled to 51.88, bringing the average to 51.82.

Volume for the day reached USD516 million, down from USD656.3 million a day ago.

The currency pair is seen to trade between 51.80 and 52.00 Tuesday.

Also, the PSEi recovered and ended its three-day slump due to bargain hunting. It went up by 0.38 percent, or 32.42 points, to 8,499.98 points.

The broader All Shares followed with a 0.06 percent, or 2.82 points, hike to 5,066.38 points.

Most of the sectors also finished with gains, led by the Financials through a 1.59 percent increase.

Industrial, Mining and Oil and Holding Firms also ended positively after these increased by 0.81 percent, 0.60 percent and 0.005 percent, respectively.

On the other hand, Property fell by 0.83 percent and Services by 0.40 percent.

Volume reached 4.81 billion shares amounting to PHP9.9 billion.

Losers, however, continue to surpass gainers at 112 to 105 while 43 shares were unchanged.