By Joann Villanueva/PNA
MANILA — The Chinese government’s announcement of fiscal stimuli reverberated across regional markets, boosting sentiments locally and resulted in the rise of the Philippines’ main equities gauge Monday but the peso still ended flat.
The Philippine Stock Exchange index (PSEi) rose 0.96 percent, or 74.74 points, to 7,873.02 points, which BPI Research said simply follows the regional trend at the moment.
This, after China Premier Li Keqiang said the government will cut the value added tax on April 1 to help address the slowdown of the world’s second largest economy.
Another factor that lifted the main gauge were reports that US and Chinese officials are making good progress in negotiations to end the trade stand-off.
Most of the other counters tracked the main index, with the broader All Shares up by 0.67 percent, or 32.39 points, to 4,845.42 points.
Mining and Oil posted the higher increase with 1.37 percent and was followed by the Holding Firms, 1.33 percent; Property, 1.11 percent; Financials, 0.75 percent; and Industrial, 0.67 percent.
Only the Services index ended the day on the red after it fell 0.26 percent.
Volume reached 1.7 billion shares amounting to PHP5.3 billion.
Gainers led losers at 94 to 93 while 54 shares were unchanged.
On the other hand, the peso ended the week’s first trading day flat at 52.65.
BPI Research attributed this to “investors seeking for clear direction ahead of Federal Reserve and BSP Monetary Board Meeting later in the week.”
Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas’ (BSP) policy-making Monetary Board (MB) will have its second rate-setting meet for this year on March 21, while the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) will have its second meeting for the year from March 19-20.
For the day, the peso opened at 52.63, little changed from the 52.64 Friday last week.
It traded between 52.72 and 52.62, resulting to an average of 52.683.
Volume reached USD846.4 million, lower than the USD976.4 million in the previous session.
The currency pair is seen to trade between 52.55 and 52.75 Tuesday.
