Singapore Shares May Extend Friday's Losses

(RTTNews) - The Singapore stock market ticked lower again on Friday, one day after ending the two-day slide in which it had slumped almost 20 points or 0.6 percent. The Straits Times Index now sits just above the 3,330-point plateau and the losses may accelerate on Monday.

The global forecast for the Asian markets is negative as Friday's U.S. jobs report fueled uncertainty about the outlook for interest rates. The European and U.S. markets saw modest losses and the Asian bourses figure to follow suit.

The STI finished barely lower on Friday following mixed performances from the financial shares, property stocks and industrial issues.

For the day, the index eased 0.04 points or 0.00 percent to finish at 3,330.77 after trading between 3,328.79 and 3,347.95.

Among the actives, CapitaLand Integrated Commercial Trust rose 0.50 percent, while CapitaLand Investment improved 0.38 percent, DBS Group perked 0.06 percent, Emperador retreated 1.15 percent, Genting Singapore gained 0.56 percent, Hongkong Land tumbled 1.44 percent, Keppel DC REIT decline 1.10 percent, Keppel Ltd shed 0.30 percent, Mapletree Pan Asia Commercial Trust rallied 0.80 percent, Oversea-Chinese Banking Corporation fell 0.21 percent, SATS jumped 1.72 percent, Seatrium Limited added 0.59 percent, SingTel sank 0.40 percent, Yangzijiang Financial surged 3.03 percent, Yangzijiang Shipbuilding soared 2.99 percent and Thai Beverage, Wilmar International, Mapletree Industrial Trust, Mapletree Logistics Trust, City Developments, Comfort DelGro, SembCorp Industries and Singapore Technologies Engineering were unchanged.

The lead from Wall Street is soft as the major averages opened lower on Friday, bounced higher at midday but faded going into the close to end with mild losses.

The Dow shed 87.21 points or 0.22 percent to finish at 38,798.99, while the NASDAQ sank 39.97 points or 0.23 percent to close at 17,133.12 and the S&P 500 fell 5.97 points or 0.11 percent to end at 5,346.99.

For the week, the NASDAQ surged 2.4 percent, the S&P jumped 1.3 percent and the Dow rose 0.3 percent.

The choppy trading on Wall Street came as traders reacted to the Labor Department's closely watched monthly jobs report, which showed employment jumped more than expected in May but also saw an unexpected uptick in the unemployment rate.

Oil futures settled flat on Friday on concerns the Federal Reserve may hold interest rates higher for longer following the stronger than expected U.S. non-farm payroll report for May. West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures for July ended at $75.53 a barrel, down $0.02. WTI crude futures shed about 2 percent in the week.