Lackluster trading brings down stocks

MANILA, Philippines — The local stock market opened the week in a somber mood due to the lack of positive catalysts, prompting fund managers to park their funds in Wall Street as US stocks continue to break record highs.

The benchmark Philippine Stock Exchange index (PSEi) closed 35.05 points or 0.54 percent lower to 6,459.76 while the broader All Shares index slipped 12.49 points or 0.31 percent to finish at 3,969.02.

Declining stocks greatly outnumbered advancers, 119 to 81, while 47 issues were unchanged.

“Weakness continued to persist as the country’s COVID-19 situation keeps worsening despite vaccine availability. Net foreign selling persisted for the 12th straight session with P511 million, excluding block sales, while value turnover was P4.5 billion,” AB Capital Securities said in a market commentary.

“Philippine shares closed in the red as investors continued to pile up stock in the US following the country’s strong earnings from the blue chips and sound economic data, supporting economic recovery,” Luis Limlingan of Regina Capital said.

Rizal Commercial Banking Corp. chief economist Michael Ricafort said the market has been in consolidation mode and confined in the range of 6,400 to 6,600 levels for more than a month already.

For COL Financial chief technical analyst Juanis Barredo, the index still needs to show more rebound action if it wishes to pull out of its pressing corrective wave.

“US markets have been on a tear lately, reaching record highs on the back of their mass vaccination program and this offers us a trail as to the potential direction of our stock market – that is, until we see a similar program happening on the ground and COVID-19 cases have started to subside, the PSEi will likely continue to move without conviction and just proceed within a range,” he said.