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Asean Stock Watch- October 17

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US
US stocks surged ahead on Friday, making their biggest weekly jump in two years after positive retail sales from major companies and the start of Group of 20 (G20) major economies talks on the eurozone debt crisis.

Shares of Internet giant Google Inc. jumped 5.9 per cent after sales exceeded analysts’ expectations. Apple Inc. gained 3.3 percent as the company is poised to sell as many as 4 million units of its new iPhone 4S this weekend after customers lined up to buy one of the last products developed under tech guru Steve Jobs.

The blue-chip Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 166.36 points, or 1.45 per cent, to 11,644.49. The broader Standard & Poor’s Index gained 20.92 points, or 1.74 per cent, to 1,224.58. The technology-heavy Nasdaq Composite Index was up 47.61 points, or 1.82 per cent, to 2,667.85.

Stocks jumped since last week by 4.88 per cent on the Dow, 5.98 per cent on the S&P 500, and 7.6 per cent on the Nasdaq.
The US dollar dropped marginally against the euro to 72.04 euro cents from 72.59 euro cents on Thursday. The dollar rose against the Japanese currency to 77.22 from 76.88 yen on Wednesday.

Indonesia
Stocks in Jakarta swung between gains and losses before closing slightly lower on Friday, as some investors cashed in following a four-day advance.

The Jakarta Composite Index dropped 10.70 points, or 0.3 percent, to close at 3,664.68. It had gained 7.3 percent during its four-day winning streak.

About 5.36 billion shares valued at Rp 5.34 trillion ($603.4 million) changed hands on the Indonesia Stock Exchange. Gainers still beat decliners by 105 to 91.

“The index had rallied for four days straight up through Thursday, and it wouldn’t have been healthy if there had not been a correction in the trading,” said Abidan Saragih, an analyst at Pacific 2000 Securities.

Consumer-focused stocks, which had gained significantly in the past few days, were affected the most, Abidan said.

Indomobil Sukses Internasional, the second-largest listed automotive distributor, lost 0.9 percent to Rp 11,700, paring a 16 percent gain over the previous four days. XL Axiata, the third-largest cellular provider, dropped 3.7 percent to close at Rp 5,150, halting a four-day, 12 percent gain. Cigarette maker Gudang Garam fell 3.1 percent to Rp 57,100.

Cushioning the decline was a gain of 1.2 percent in the basic industry sector, which includes cement makers and chemical companies. Semen Gresik, the largest listed cement producer, rose 4.1 percent to Rp 8,950.

The agribusiness sector edged up 0.4 percent. Astra Agro Lestari, the largest listed crude palm oil producer, added 0.5 percent to Rp 18,800. Bakrie Sumatera Plantations rose 1.7 percent to Rp 305. Crude palm oil futures were up 2.2 percent in Bursa Malaysia for delivery in December.

Bumi Resources, the largest listed coal producer, jumped 3.5 percent to Rp 2,250 on speculation of a Glencore acquisition. Reuters reported that Glencore had set aside $900 million to acquire shares in the company.

The rupiah gained 0.2 percent to trade at 8,893 against the dollar. It lost 0.3 percent for the week.

The 10-year bond yield, which moves inversely to price, fell to 6.3789 percent on Friday, from 6.4283 percent the day before, according to the Indonesia Bond Pricing Agency

Malaysia
Bursa Malaysia is likely to see a healthy dip this week, to pull back towards 1,420-point support level before trending higher for a reasonably positive fourth quarter, dealers said.

Head of retail research at Affin Investment Bank, Dr. Nazri Khan, said the index was ripe for a pullback, which was necessary since the market was overbought and minor resistance level was spotted at 1,450 level.

"The weakness is seen as healthy although market's direction next week will likely centre on worries about growth in China, Spain's credit rating downgrade, Fitch's negative watch on multiple big banks and reports that Deutsche Bank needed ?9 billion to survive the stress tests," he said here today.

On the local front, Nazri said, any dip was an opportunity to buy.

"In the meantime, there will be ample local positive news flow to add more steam to the current rally," he said.

Meanwhile, TA Securities senior technical analyst, Stephen Soo, said if the market's volume remained above one billion units, or preferrably 1.5 billion units, it would be positive for the broader market.

"We expect to see the barometer hover between 1,420 and 1,450 level next week," he said.

For the week just-ended, the FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) fell 2.44 points to 1,442.43 from last Friday's 1,400.05.

Trading was choppy, testing the fragile investor confidence amid eurozone's debt crisis.

On a week-to week basis, the Finance Index rose 471.76 points to 13,242.59, Plantation Index jumped 222.22 points to 7,309.23 and the Industrial Index rose 101.22 points to 2,632.14.

The FBM Emas went up 327.27 points to 9,801.53, FBMT100 increased 304.34 points to 9,633.87, FBM Ace Index edged up 231.21 points to 3,879.07 and the FBM70 Index rose 417.60 points to 10,472.22.

Total weekly volume increased to 5.305 billion shares worth RM6.485 billion from 4.08 billion shares worth RM6.17 billion last week.

Main market turnover rose to 3.943 billion units valued at RM6.339 billion from 3.16 billion units valued at RM6.06 billion previously.

Warrants increased to 691.914 million shares worth RM50.001 million from 301.66 million shares worth RM24.82 million last Friday.

Volume on the ACE market increased to 1.963 million units valued at RM87.073 million from 604.48 million units valued at 75.55 million last week.

Philippines
Philippine share prices on Friday ignored the slump of global equity markets following Standard & Poor’s downgrade of Spain’s credit rating.

At the Philippine Stock Exchange, the composite index added 18.92 points, or 0.46 percent to 4,153.40, while the broader all-shares index inched up 3.67 points, or 0.13 percent to 2,943.07.

A total of 2.91 billion stocks worth P3.50 billion changed hands. Advancers led decliners, 79 to 59, while 41 stocks were unchanged.

“After a long rally, the Dow only fell by [40] points, an indication that it’s still quite strong. We don’t really consider it down,” said Joseph Roxas, president of Eagle Equities.

“While other countries are slowing down, we’re still positive so I think we’re okay,” Roxas added.

Overnight, the Dow Jones Industrial Average pared its losses to 40.72 points, or 0.4 percent, to 11,478.13 following the disappointing earnings result of J.P. Morgan Chase. The benchmark index fell by as much as 141 points.

The S&P 500 index and Nasdaq finished in the green.

“Other news abroad such as another round of bond purchases from the Federal Reserve and improving jobs data gave a reason to be optimistic,” said Freya Natividad, investment analyst at 2TradeAsia.com.

S&P’s downgrade of Spain weighed on global sentiment, threatening initiatives to address Europe’s sovereign-debt crisis even after Slovakia ratified an overhauled bailout fund.

Asian currencies were mixed Friday, with the peso moving sideways.

At the Philippine Dealing System, the local currency gained 15 centavos to close at 43.355 against the US dollar from 43.370 the previous trading day.

The dollar-peso pair opened at 43.500 and moved to a high of 43.600 and to a low of 43.340.

Total trading volume reached $939.720 million from $839.800 million last Thursday.
Singapore
On Friday the Singapore Exchange (SGX) closed at 2,744.17 up 10.20.

Thailand
The Stock Exchange of Thailand main index went up 18.99 points or 2.03 percent to close at 955.81 points at the end of trading session on Friday Afternoon. The trade value was 19.99 billion baht, with 3.63 billion shares traded.

The SET50 index ended at 673.43 points, up 15.26 points or 2.32 percent, with a total trade value of 14.18 billion baht.
The SET100 index rose 32.71 points or 2.30 percent to stand at 1,457.42 points, with a total turnover of 17.48 billion baht.
The SETHD index went up 19.08 points or 2.06 percent to stand at 945.14 points, with total trade value of 6.03 billion baht.
The MAI index gained 0.94 points or 0.38 percent to close at 247.36 points, with total transaction value of 482.42 million baht.

Top five most active values were as follows;
PTT       closed at   292.00 baht, up 8.00 baht (2.82 percent)
JAS        closed at       1.75 baht, up 0.09 baht (5.42 percent)
SCC       closed at   294.00 baht, up 7.00 baht (2.44 percent)
PTTEP   closed at   150.00 baht, up 6.00 baht (4.17 percent)
KBANK   closed at   118.50 baht, up 3.00 baht (2.60 percent)

Vietnam
The two national benchmark indices surprised market watchers by adding value yesterday, following the release of a report by a Ha Noi-based financial information company which projected that inflation would slow in October to a rate of just 0.5 percent over the previous month.

The report predicted that food, educational services and housing would have the greatest impact on the inflation rate this month.

Yesterday, the State Bank of Viet Nam also devalued the Vietnamese dong against the US dollar for a sixth consecutive days, adjusting the interbank exchange rate by another VND10 per dollar to VND20,688.

Independent analyst Nguyen Van Thuan believed that the central bank would be able to keep the fluctuation of the exchange rate at below 1 percent this year. HCM Securities Co analysts agreed, predicting that the SBV would delay any devaluation to next year. However, it was likely that the central bank would depreciate the currency by as much as 5 percent earlier next year.

"Investment in foreign currencies will therefore become attractive, absorbing cash away from securities market," said Viet Vinh from the financial information website vietstock.vn.

On the HCM Stock Exchange, the VN-Index edged up 0.46 percent to conclude yesterday's session at 414.49 points.
Advancers outnumbered decliners by a two-to-one margin, but both market value fell by about 25 percent from Thursday's levels to VND329.35 billion (US$15.9 million), on a volume of 21.8 million shares.

While a majority of the 10 leading shares by capitalisation managed gains, Eximbank (EIB) , Vietinbank (CTG) and PetroVietnam Finance (PVF) all declined by 0.8-1.9 percent.
The most-active share was real estate developer Hoang Quan (HQC), which saw a volume of about 1.7 million units before hitting its ceiling price.

On the Ha Noi Stock Exchange, the HNX-Index added 0.12 percent to close at 69.19 points with a third of all stocks posting gains. The value of trades was anemic, however, reaching just VND256.3 billion ($12.4 million) with only 24.2 million shares traded. Construction giant Vinaconex (VCG) saw the highest volume, with 1.9 million shares changing hands.