Straits Times Index tracks Wall Street losses
Wednesday February 20, 1:24 PM
sg.news.yahoo.com
SINGAPORE (Reuters) - Singapore shares stumbled lower by midday on Wednesday in cautious trade as Wall Street's losses and corporate earnings concerns took centre stage.
By the lunch break, the benchmark Straits Times Index was down 1.14 percent or 19.82 points at 1,722.91. It has gained more than six percent since the start of the year.
In the broader market, losers led gainers 145 to 56, with 131 issues unchanged. Total volume was a moderate 276 million shares.
U.S. stocks sank on Tuesday, with the tech-laden Nasdaq scraping lows not seen since early November amid unrelenting fears about dubious accounting practices and corporate debt woes.
The Dow Jones industrial average lost 157.90 points or 1.59 percent to 9,745.14 and the Nasdaq Composite Index sank 54.59 points or 3.02 percent to 1,750.61 after hitting a new session low of 1,745.05.
"It's the blue chips that are getting the battering this morning due to Wall Street's losses and worries over bank earnings after DBS Bank's disappointing results, but selling pressure is mild," said a director of institutional sales at a bank-backed brokerage.
That aside, retail punting in second liners and penny stocks was again dominating activity, traders said. |
