Peso sustains strength, PSEi downed by US-China trade worries

The Philippine Peso ended the week stronger against the greenback but the main equities index fell ahead of the release of US’ non-farm payrolls report for March 2018. (PIXABAY PHOTO)

MANILA — The Philippine Peso ended the week stronger against the greenback but the main equities index fell ahead of the release of US’ non-farm payrolls report for March 2018.

The local unit finished the week at 52.02 from Thursday’s 52.11, which a trader said was due to investors’ wait-and-see stance following the continued souring of US-China relations. For the day, the peso opened at 52.15, little changed against its 52.12 opening a day ago.
It traded between 52.16 and 52.01, resulting to an average of 52.08.

Trades were stronger after volume reached USD 645.8 million compared to the USD483 million in the previous session. The currency pair is seen to trade between 52.00 and 52.30 next week.

Meanwhile, the Philippine Stock Exchange index (PSEi) returned to the 7,900-level after it fell 0.95 percent, or 76.50 points, to7,945.66 points.
Most of the other gauges tracked the main index, with the All Shares down by 0.74 percent, or 35.95 points, to 4,828.50 points.
Property registered the highest decline among the sectors at 1.40 percent followed by Financials, 1.24 percent; Industrial, 1.23 percent; and Holding Firms, 0.54 points.

At the other end are Mining and Oil as well as Services, which improved by 0.62 percent and 0.40 percent, respectively. Volume reached 2.37 billion shares amounting to Php7.6 billion.

Losers led gainers at 130 to 80 while 40 shares were unchanged.