Bulls And Bears

Asian markets mixed despite Wall St highs

STI up 0.15% amid high turnover mainly attributable to FTSE index changes

Regional investors closed the week with a mixed session yesterday, despite Wall Street extending record highs on Thursday following confirmation that a "phase one" trade deal is a go.

The Straits Times Index (STI) spent much of the session floating around before a late bump sent it up 4.97 points or 0.15 per cent at 3,212.39, and ahead by 17.68 points or 0.6 per cent for the week.

Elsewhere in the region, Australia, China, Japan, South Korea and Taiwan all dipped, while Hong Kong and Malaysia posted gains.

While this week's market performance in Asia has paled in comparison with that in the United States and Europe, investors are likely to continue rotating into risk-friendly assets to end the year.

"Global indices are likely to remain buoyant from the window-dressing effect, which would generally kick in during this period," Phillip Futures investment analyst Samuel Siew noted.

Trading volume here clocked in at 1.32 billion shares worth $1.43 billion, with losers outpacing gainers 198 to 182.

Market watchers noted that yesterday's high volume and turnover were mainly attributable to activity on counters that are being added or dropped from FTSE indices on Monday.

Mapletree Logistics Trust (MLT), which will be added to the STI, gained 1.2 per cent to $1.70, with 25.2 million units traded.

Meanwhile, plantation owner Golden Agri-Resources, which will be replaced by MLT, was unchanged at 21 cents on trade of 93.6 million.

Manulife US Reit closed 2.9 per cent lower at US$1 with 64.6 million units changing hands ahead of its FTSE EPRA Nareit Index inclusion.

Sasseur Reit fell 1.7 per cent to 88.5 cents prior to its inclusion in the FTSE EPRA Nareit Global Emerging Index.

E-commerce-focused EC World Reit dipped 0.65 per cent to 76 cents with 20.1 million units traded. Yesterday's volume was mainly due to a married trade of 17.5 million units or 2.2 per cent of total outstanding shares at 73.4 cents.

Among the pennies, Rex International added 1.1 per cent to 18.8 cents. Masirah Oil, an indirect unit of the upstream oil and gas company, is proposing to issue US$4.5 million of preference shares to Trace Atlantic Oil to fund its drilling activities and operations in Oman.

Rex's indirect stake of 92.65 per cent in Masirah will be reduced to 87.4 per cent following the deal.

Join ST's Telegram channel and get the latest breaking news delivered to you.

A version of this article appeared in the print edition of The Straits Times on December 21, 2019, with the headline Asian markets mixed despite Wall St highs. Subscribe