Asia: Markets rebound

Asian markets rose yesterday Wednesday October 31, with Tokyo rebounding from the previous day’s losses as dealers welcomed the Bank of Japan’s latest stimulus push.

Trade was thin, with Wall Street closed for a second day as superstorm Sandy hit New York. Investors were awaiting the release of key data, including on Chinese manufacturing and US jobs.

Tokyo rose 0.98 p ercent, or 86.31 points, to 8,928.29, Sydney gained 0.70 per cent, or 31.3 points, to close at 4,517.0 and Seoul was 0.66 per cent higher, adding 12.48 points to 1,912.06. Shanghai closed up 0.32 per cent, or 6.53 points, at 2,068.88.

Eyes are now on the release of China’s manufacturing activity data, with analysts increasingly optimistic China has seen the worst of a slowdown that stretches back to last year.

And Washington will unveil its last set of non-farm payrolls figures for the US economy on Friday, following last month’s much improved result, which also lifted hopes for future growth.

There is “some optimism before China’s manufacturing and US non-farm payrolls data this week”, said Angus Gluskie, managing director at White Funds Management in Australia.

“People are starting to think economic conditions globally are starting to improve,” he said.

HONG KONG: SHARES rose one per cent yesterday, boosted by bargain-buying following a three-day losing streak.
The benchmark Hang Seng Index gained 213.24 points to 21,641.82.
Traders were looking ahead to the release of Chinese manufacturing activity data, with many confident it will reinforce recent views that its recent slowdown has bottomed out.
Adding to buying sentiment was news the Hong Kong Monetary Authority had intervened in the forex market for the fifth time in 11 days – selling HK$ 2.713 billion to curb the local unit’s rise against the greenback.
Chinese bank ICBC added 2 per cent to HK$5.13.

SINGAPORE: THE FTSE Straits Times Index (STI) ended the last session of the month flat, down 0.01 per cent, 0.36 points, at 3,038.37. This brings the gain of the STI to +14.81 per cent over the first 10 months of 2012.
There were 17 gainers, 4 unchanged and 9 decliners.
Top active stocks were GoldenAgri (-1.58 per cent), SingTel (-0.31 per cent), Keppel Corp (unchanged) and DBS (-0.64 per cent).
United Overseas Bank fell 0.76 per cent to S$18.27 and Wilmar International shed 0.64 per cent to S$3.09.

KUALA LUMPUR: SHARE prices on Bursa Malaysia ended marginally lower yesterday, prompted by profit-taking activities in selected blue chips following recent gains, dealers said. The benchmark FBM KLCI was 1.6 points lower at 1,673.07.
The key index peaked at an intra-day high of 1,676.19 in the early session to record a new high.
TA Securities senior technical analyst Stephen Soo said although the market turned into negative territory after the morning session, it received support from the lower liners to limit the losses.
“The day’s volume was mostly contributed by interest seen in penny stocks from retailers,” he said.
On the broader market, losers led gainers by 353 to 342, while 342 counters were flat, 623 counters untraded and 31 suspended.
Among actives, Tiger Synergy and Asia Media Group added five sen each to 40 sen and 42 sen, respectively, Ingenuity Consolidated added 1.5 sen to 10 sen while TH Heavy Engineering lost 2.5 sen to 59 sen.
Of the heavyweights, CIMB and Petronas Chemicals improved 1 sen each to RM7.63 and RM6.50 respectively.
Maybank lost 1 sen to RM9.03, Sime Darby and Maxis slipped 2 sen each to RM9.78 and RM6.96, respectively, while Axiata was flat at RM6.53.
Meanwhile, FBM KLCI futures ended mostly lower in line with the equity market, dealers said.
October 2012 fell 2.5 points to 1,673, December 2012 lost 2 points to 1,673.5, November 2012 declined 1 point to 1,674 and March 2013 slipped 0.5point to 1,666.5.
Turnover fell to 8,709 lots from 17,056 lots on Tuesday while open interest shed to 43,701 contracts from 53,153 contracts previously.

In other markets:

* Taipei fell 0.23 per cent, or 16.54 points, to 7,166.05.

* Manila ended flat, easing 2.16 points to 5,424.51.

* Wellington closed 0.42 per cent higher, adding 16.59 points to 3,957.88.

* Jakarta closed 0.33 per cent, or 14.31 points, lower at 4,350.29.

* Bangkok gained 0.34 per cent, or 4.44 points, to 1,298.87.

* Mumbai rose 74.53 points, or 0.40 per cent, to 18,505.38.

VIETNAM:  Vietnamese shares continued to close down today, heavy put-through EIB deals boosted trading volume.
The benchmark VN Index lost 1.44 points or 0.37% to 388.42. Volume rose 150%to 57.63 million shares worth of VND890.5 billion.
Put through trading contributed 37.7 million shares worth of VND625.98 billion. We saw  35.08 million EIB shares changed hands ceiling level of VND16,000 each.
Today’s market breadth was negative on the primary bourse where 82 stocks advanced, 101 declined, 127 closed unchanged.
For the month, VN Index lost 4.15 points or 1.06% while year to date, VN Index still gained 36.87 points or 10.5%.
The VN30 fell 0.48 point or 0.1%, to 458.56. Among its 30 members 13 gained, 11 lost the ground and 6 unchanged.
VN Index opened in the red with 0.7 million shares changed hands as caution rose. Trading was sluggish, liquidity would have been drained without put-through deals.
On the Hanoi Stock Exchange, the HNX lost 0.11 point or 0.21% to 53.02.
Trading volume fell 35.6% to 22.2 million shares worth VND137.2 billion.
The market breadth was negative where 61 rallied, 92 declined, 240 closed unmoved of which some untraded.
In October, HN Index lót 2.45 points or 4.4% extending its YTD losses to 5.72 points or 9.7%.
The HNX30 bucked trend to close up 0.09 point or 0.09% to 97.59. Of its 30 members, 8 rallied, 11 declined, 11 closed unmoved.

EUROPE: Most European stocks climbed, with the benchmark Stoxx Europe 600 Index heading for a fifth straight month of gains, as Air France-KLM Group and Deutsche Lufthansa AG posted earnings that beat estimates.
Air France-KLM and Lufthansa both rallied at least 6 per cent.
ArcelorMittal declined 4.6 per cent after the world’s biggest steelmaker posted its lowest quarterly profit in almost three years. BG Group Plc sank 17 per cent after it forecast production growth that disappointed investors.
The Stoxx 600 added 0.1 per cent to 272.0 at 12:35pm in London.
European stocks rallied the most in two weeks on Tuesday as companies reported earnings that topped estimates and economic data showed an increase in US house prices.

AMERICA:  Stocks closed mixed on Wednesday in their first session since Superstorm Sandy forced a historic two-day shutdown of trading.

The Dow Jones industrial average slipped 10.75 points to 13,096.46. The Standard & Poor’s 500 index rose, but barely — up 0.22 of a point to 1,412.16.

Investors were nervous that a flood of orders after two days of pent-up demand from customers might lead to volatile trading. But stock prices barely budged at the opening, and stayed within a tight range throughout the day.

“It’s been very smooth,” Duncan Niederauer, CEO of NYSE Euronext, told CNBC from the exchange floor shortly after the opening bell. “The market-making community is more than staffed enough to be open.”

The last time the New York Stock Exchange closed for two consecutive days because of weather was during the Blizzard of 1888 — 124 years ago. Since power was out in large parts of downtown Manhattan on Wednesday, the trading floor had to be run on backup generators.

Home Depot and Lowe’s rose as investors anticipated more business for the home improvement chains as people made repairs in the aftermath of the devastating storm. Home Depot gained $1.34 to $61.38 and Lowe’s rose $1.02 to $32.38.

Netflix soared $9.66 to $79.24 after financier Carl Icahn said he had bought a 10 percent stake in the troubled company.

Among the losers were insurers Chubb, Allstate and Travelers. Investors worried that the companies are most likely to suffer losses due to insurance claims. The trio have a large share of the insurance market in areas where Hurricane Sandy hit.

Chubb fell 98 cents to $76.98, Travelers dropped 62 cents to $70.94 and Allstate slipped 17 cents to $39.98.

Half of the ten industry sectors in the S&P 500 fell. Health-care stocks were down 0.7 percent, the biggest drop. Utility stocks led the gainers with a rise of 0.8 percent.

Stocks flitted between small gains and losses in the last hour of trading. The indexes started the day higher than the close on Friday, the last trading day. Then they dropped, and stayed in the red for much of the day.

The tech-heavy Nasdaq composite lost 10.72 points to 2,977.23.

The opening followed days of scrambling by NYSE officials to make sure power, telecom connections and computers would be ready. Many workers on the floor use the subways to get downtown, but Hurricane Sandy left the system with its worst damage in its 108-year history. New York’s governor, Andrew Cuomo, says limited subway service will resume in New York City on Thursday.

About three stocks rose for every one that fell on the New York Stock Exchange. Trading volume was 3.4 billion shares, in line with the recent average.

The yield on the 10-year Treasury note fell to 1.69 percent from 1.72 percent at midday Monday. Bond trading was closed Tuesday and ended early Monday because of the storm.

Among other stocks making big moves:

—Facebook fell 83 cents to $21.11, a loss of nearly 4 percent. Facebook employees became eligible this week to sell restricted stock for the first time. Up to 1.5 billion more shares could be sold, about 3.5 times the 421 million shares that had been trading since Facebook’s initial public offering in May.

— General Motors jumped $2.22 to $25.50 after the company reported a turnaround in its South American business and gave a brighter outlook for sales in Europe. GM posted better-than-expected results internationally outside of China

— Apple fell $8.68 to $595.32. The Wall Street Journal reported that the head of Apple’s iPhone software development was asked to resign after he refused to sign a letter apologizing for the flaws of Apple’s mapping application.

Benchmark Currency Rates

	USD	EUR	JPY	GBP	CHF	CAD	AUD	HKD
USD	–	1.2963	0.0125	1.6128	1.0736	1.0002	1.0381	0.1290
EUR	0.7714	–	0.0097	1.2441	0.8282	0.7716	0.8007	0.0995
JPY	79.8800	103.5500	–	128.8020	85.7570	79.9000	82.9270	10.3069
GBP	0.6201	0.8039	0.0078	–	0.6657	0.6203	0.6437	0.0800
CHF	0.9314	1.2075	0.0117	1.5020	–	0.9317	0.9668	0.1202
CAD	0.9997	1.2960	0.0125	1.6123	1.0734	–	1.0379	0.1290
AUD	0.9632	1.2490	0.0121	1.5534	1.0344	0.9637	–	0.1243
HKD	7.7501	10.0472	0.0970	12.4981	8.3204	7.7519	8.0461	–

 

Category: FinanceAsia