MANILA – The Philippine Stock Exchange index (PSEi) rose Wednesday on bargain hunting while the peso ended the day sideways against the US dollar.
The main equities index rose by 2.33 percent, or 144.53 points, to 6,341.24 points.
All the other counters tracked the main gauge, with All Shares up by 1.68 percent, or 64.61 points, to 3,899.39 points.
Property index registered the highest increase among the sectoral indexes after it jumped by 3.02 percent and was trailed by the Holding Firms, 2.45 percent; Services, 2.18 percent; Mining and Oil, 1.47 percent; Financials, 1.33 percent; and Industrial, 0.78 percent.
Volume totaled 1.26 billion shares amounting to PHP13.09 billion.
Gainers led losers at 140 to 74, while 47 shares were unchanged.
“It (increase) was just mainly on bargain hunting,” Sun Life Asset Management Company Inc. (SLAMCI) chief investment officer Mike Enriquez said in a virtual briefing Wednesday.
Enriquez said this comes after days of sell-off due to the impact of the rebalancing of the Morgan Stanley Capital International’s (MSCI)) world index that will take effect on Thursday, which he expects outflows to amount around USD240 million.
He identified other factors that affected the equities trading for the day which were the anticipation for the announcement on the quarantine classification around the country for June, and the landmark PHP55.89-billion Monde Nissin Corp. initial public offering (IPO), which is scheduled to be listed on June 1.
“So if that IPO is successful for day 1, then that would hopefully bring back foreign investor appetite in the market,” he added.
Meanwhile, the peso finished the day’s trade at 48.135 from the previous session’s 48.065.
It opened the day at 48.05 and traded between 48.16 and 48.00.
Average level for the day stood at 48.079.
Volume reached USD1.04 billion, higher than the previous session’s USD937.64 million.
Enriquez expects the peso to trade between PHP48-PHP50 level against the greenback this year. (PNA)
