Singapore stocks retreat, tracking Wall Street losses; STI down 0.5% at open

SINGAPORE shares pulled back at Friday's open, following a weak lead from US indices overnight.

Said DailyFX strategist Margaret Yang: "Asia-Pacific equities look set to trade lower amid 'risk off' sentiment, following a sour session on Wall Street overnight. All three major US indices pulled back from recent highs as profit-taking activity kicked in."

On the Singapore bourse, the Straits Times Index (STI) shed 13.87 points or 0.5 per cent to 2,894.98 as at 9.01am.

Decliners outnumbered advancers 72 to 51, after about 91.6 million securities worth S$42.7 million changed hands.

Among the index securities, the most heavily traded by volume was Genting Singapore, which was flat at 83.5 Singapore cents, with 1.5 million shares traded. ComfortDelGro slipped S$0.01 or 0.6 per cent to S$1.58, with about 666,000 shares changing hands.

The trio of local lenders were down in early trade. DBS lost S$0.13 or 0.5 per cent to S$25.63, UOB dropped S$0.15 or 0.6 per cent to S$23.78, while OCBC fell S$0.09 or 0.9 per cent to S$10.56.

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KIM, a wholly-owned unit of OCBC, has acquired the remaining 51 per cent stake it did not already own in Malaysia-incorporated Horizon Asset Management for RM2.55 million (S$837,650) in cash. This makes Horizon a fully-owned unit of OCBC, said the bank in a Thursday filing after markets closed.

Meanwhile, Keppel Reit declined 0.5 Singapore cent or 4.2 per cent to S$1.14. The issue price for the real estate investment trust's private placement has been fixed at S$1.13, about midway of its indicative range, its manager announced in a bourse filing late on Thursday night. The placement was about 4.6 times covered. A total of 238.9 million new units will be issued under the private placement to raise gross proceeds of about S$270 million.

Separately, Thomson Medical fell 0.2 Singapore cent or 2.1 per cent to 9.5 cents. The counter rallied to hit an intraday high of 9.9 Singapore cents on Thursday, surpassing its 52-week high of 9.5 cents. Trading in Thomson Medical's warrants picked up as well, with 21.5 million warrants changing hands over the day.

Over on Wall Street, equities declined on Thursday following disappointing US labour data and Walmart results, and as key players in the GameStop trading upheaval defended their actions at a Capitol Hill hearing.

The Dow Jones Industrial Average finished 0.4 per cent lower at 31,493.34. The broad-based S&P 500 shed 0.4 per cent to 3,913.97, while the tech-rich Nasdaq Composite Index dropped 0.7 per cent to 13,865.36.

Meanwhile, European shares marked a third straight day of losses on Thursday, as a clutch of disappointing earnings reports added to rising inflation concerns due to higher commodity prices and a strong euro. The pan-European Stoxx 600 fell 0.8 per cent, with oil and gas stocks leading the losses despite higher crude prices.

Elsewhere in Asia, Tokyo stocks opened lower on Friday, tracking falls on Wall Street. The benchmark Nikkei 225 index was down 0.6 per cent or 183.00 points at 30,053.09 in early trade, while the broader Topix index slipped 0.7 per cent or 12.75 points to 1,929.16.