Stocks rebound as US, China agree to extend truce
PHILIPPINE SHARES booked a modest rebound on Wednesday after the United States and China reached a deal to continue their tariff truce.
The main Philippine Stock Exchange index (PSEi) rose by 0.53% or 33.65 points to close at 6,381.32, while the broader all shares index went up by 0.47% or 17.69 points to 3,776.19.
Philippine financial markets are closed on Thursday (June 12) for the Independence Day holiday.
“The local market ended higher following the positive cues from Wall Street. Investors cheered the consensus reached by the US and China in their trade talks in London,” Philstocks Financial Inc. Research Manager Japhet Louis O. Tantiangco said in a Viber message.
“The PSEi corrected higher after the US and China agreed to a preliminary plan to ease trade tensions, and also after US stock markets gained further to near record highs recently,” Rizal Commercial Banking Corp. Chief Economist Michael L. Ricafort likewise said in a Viber message.
US and Chinese officials said on Tuesday they had agreed on a framework to get their trade truce back on track and remove China’s export restrictions on rare earths while offering little sign of a durable resolution to longstanding trade tensions, Reuters reported.
At the end of two days of intense negotiations in London, US Commerce Secretary Howard Lutnick told reporters the framework deal puts “meat on the bones” of an agreement reached last month in Geneva to ease bilateral retaliatory tariffs that had reached crushing triple-digit levels.
Mr. Lutnick said the agreement reached in London would remove restrictions on Chinese exports of rare earth minerals and magnets and some of the recent US export restrictions “in a balanced way,” but did not provide details after the talks concluded around midnight London time.
On Tuesday, the S&P 500 climbed 0.55% to end the session at 6,038.81 points. The Nasdaq gained 0.63% to 19,714.99 points, while the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 0.25% to 42,866.87 points.
Back home, all sectoral indices closed higher on Wednesday. Industrials climbed by 0.96% or 85.68 points to 8,971.66; holding firms went up by 0.9% or 49.69 points to 5,515.68; property increased by 0.87% or 19.61 points to 2,261.41; services rose by 0.72% or 15.93 points to 2,227.29; mining and oil ascended by 0.53% or 50.06 points to 9,475.57; and financials edged up by 0.03% or 0.75 point to 2,331.54.
“JG Summit Holdings, Inc. was the day’s top index gainer, climbing 4.27% to P19.04. Universal Robina Corp. was at the bottom, falling 3.31% to P83.15,” Mr. Tantiangco said.
Value turnover decreased to P7.14 billion on Wednesday with 897.37 million shares exchanged from the P9.39 billion with 1.45 billion issues traded on Tuesday.
Advancers outnumbered decliners, 104 versus 91, while 44 names were unchanged.
Net foreign selling went down to P30.21 million on Wednesday from P525.73 million. — Revin Mikhael D. Ochave with Reuters
