SINGAPORE shares were trading in negative territory on Tuesday (Jan 14), after overseas markets closed mixed.
As at the midday break, the Straits Times Index (STI) was down 0.1 per cent or 5.24 points at 3,786.46. Across the broader market, gainers outnumbered losers 243 to 163 after 481.1 million securities worth S$396.8 million changed hands.
Consumer packaged foods company Zixin was the most actively traded counter by volume. It was trading flat at S$0.029 with 16 million securities transacted.
Other actively traded counters included maritime vessel maker Yangzijiang Shipbuilding, which rose 3.4 per cent or S$0.10 to S$3.05, and integrated resort operator Genting Singapore, which gained 0.7 per cent or S$0.005 to S$0.735.
First Real Estate Investment Trust (Reit) was also trading up 3.9 per cent or S$0.01 at S$0.265, with 5.7 million shares changing hands. This followed the Reit’s announcement on Monday that it received a preliminary non-binding letter of intent from Siloam International Hospitals to acquire its portfolio of hospital assets in Indonesia.
Before the market opened, beleaguered cord-blood bank Cordlife requested a trading halt after closing flat at S$0.145 on Monday, the day on which it was due for a licence renewal.
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From Sep 15, 2024, to Jan 13, 2025, the Ministry of Health had barred Cordlife from collecting, testing, processing and/or storing more than 30 units of new cord blood each month. This was to safeguard customers’ interests while it monitored the cord-blood bank’s operational stability.
The trio of banking stocks were largely down at the break. UOB was flat at S$36.80. OCBC declined 0.5 per cent or S$0.08 to S$16.89 and DBS retreated 0.8 per cent or S$0.34 to S$43.73.
Wall Street stocks closed mostly higher on Monday as two of the three major indices finished in positive territory alongside a rise in Treasury bond yields and changing monetary policy expectations.
The Dow Jones Industrial Average advanced 0.9 per cent to 42,297.12 and the broad-based S&P 500 rose 0.2 per cent to 5,836.22, while the tech-heavy Nasdaq Composite declined 0.4 per cent to 19,088.1.
US December jobs data released on Friday “strongly beat expectations” and showed that the US is headed for a “soft landing rather than recession in 2025”, said Mansoor Mohi-uddin, chief economist, Bank of Singapore.
“We thus continue to think the Fed is near the end of its easing cycle given firm growth and inflation,” he said in a note on Monday. Bank of Singapore sees only one further 25 basis points rate cut in the first half of 2025.
