MANILA — The Philippines’ main equities gauge recovered while the peso ended almost unchanged against the greenback during Thursday’s session as investors remain on the wait-and-see mode.
Philippine Stock Exchange index (PSEi) gained 0.28 percent, or 22.20 points, to 7,853.16 points, which a trader said may be attributed to investors’ decision to stay at the sidelines as official of the US and Canada resumed trade negotiations.
All Shares jumped by 0.21 percent, or 10.04 points, to 4,760.90 points.
Most of the sectors also registered increases during the day, led by the Holding Firms, 0.83 percent; and was followed by the Financials, 0.52 percent; Mining and Oil, 0.30 percent; and Industrial, 0.21 percent.
At the other end are the Services, which fell 0.28 percent; and Property, 0.21 percent.
Volume reached 1.25 billion shares amounting to Php6.33 billion.
Advancers led decliners at 99 to 97 while 50 shares were unchanged.
Also, the peso partly mirrored the main stocks index during the day after it ended the trade at 53.43 from the previous session’s 53.46.
Landbank market economist Guian Angelo S. Dumalagan, in a reply to an e-mail from PNA, said the PSEi’s recovery “could be one” of the factors that affected the local currency during the day.
“And I think bets are being placed ahead of the BSP meeting and the bank data tomorrow,” he said.
The Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP) is scheduled to release Friday this week, August 31, the results of the third quarter 2018 Business Expectations Survey (BES), the July 2018 loans data of the universal and commercial banks (U/KBs), the July 2018 gross international reserves (GIR) report.
For the day, the local unit opened at 53.43, sideways from the 53.35 Wednesday.
It traded between 53.405 and 53.485, resulting to an average of 53.434.
Volume of trade reached USD501.28 million, lower than day-ago’s USD527.3 million.
The currency pair is seen to trade between 53.30 and 53.50 Friday. (Joann Villanueva/PNA)
