Overseas trade concerns weigh down PSEi; peso keeps gains

The local currency ended the day’s trade at 52.76 from 52.74 a day ago, which Bank of the Philippine Islands (BPI), in its market report, said was due to strengthening of the greenback. (Photo: qvist / ShutterStock)

MANILA — The Philippine peso ended sideways against the US dollar during Thursday’s session but the Philippine Stock Exchange index (PSEi) failed to recover on renewed trade war concerns overseas.

The local currency ended the day’s trade at 52.76 from 52.74 a day ago, which Bank of the Philippine Islands (BPI), in its market report, said was due to strengthening of the greenback.

“USD/PHP edged higher anew tracking strong Dollars across as risk off trading carried on the second day driven by global growth concerns and trade jitters,” it said.

Amid the risk-off sentiment, the peso opened the day better at 52.7 from 52.79 in the previous session.

Its opening level is the unit’s strongest for the day after it dipped to 52.91 mid-trade.

This brought the day’s average to 52.81, weaker than the 52.706 a day ago.

Volume of trade declined to USD993.25 million from USD1.283 billion a day ago.

The currency pair is seen to trade between 52.55 and 52.85 Friday.

On the other hand, the main equities gauge contracted by 1.25 percent, or 95.58 points, to 7,535.32 points.

“Local stocks continued to bleed as negative Chinese headline jolted market sentiment in Asia,” he said.

Citing reports, the report said trade tensions are up again following the arrest by Canadian authorities of the chief financial officer of China-based information and communications technology provider Huawei, Meng Wanzhou, upon the request of US.

The arrest was made on allegations that the Chinese telco leader “sold gear to Iran despite sanctions on exports to the region,” it said.

“The move was met with strong protests by the Chinese officials, calling it as a violation against the citizen’s rights,” it added.

With this development, all the counters of the local stocks market bled and trailed the main index, with the All Shares down by 0.95 percent, or 43.24 points, to 4,530.92 points.

Property registered the highest decline after dropping 1.95 percent and was followed by the Holding Firms, 1.35 percent; Services, 0.92 percent; Mining and Oil, 0.60 percent; Industrial, 0.59 percent; and Financials, 0.43 percent.

Volume reached 4.6 billion stocks amounting to PHP7.2 billion.

Decliners led advancers at 113 to 74 while 50 shares were unchanged.