BARGAIN HUNTING LIFTS PSE INDEX

Bargain hunting lifted the Philippine Stock Exchange (PSE) index today, the locals providing limited but enough firepower to push up the indicator to a 0.94 percent or 58.70 points to 6,317.41 points, though foreign selling continued.

All the sub-indices posted gains with the financials up 0.99 percent, holding firms up 1.55 percent, services up 1.09 percent, industrials by 0.46 percent, property 0.13 percent, and mining and oil, 1.57 percent.

ICTSI bannered the picks of foreign buyers as it posted a hefty increase of 4.28 percent to P141.20, up by P5.80 with trades of P456.3 million, the second most active stock, with foreigners buying P93 million.

Metrobank and BDO Unibank posted increases of 45 centavos to P44 and P1.50 to P105.50 to nudge the rise in the financials even with a 23.18 percent decline in Philippine Savings Bank, which careened to a low of P59.15, down by P17.85 or 23.18 percent, though value turnover was a low of P1.6 million.

Ayala Land posted a 5-centavo loss to P32.20 with a turnover of P628.1 million, to again emerge as the most active stock.

Another big property developer SM Prime also went down by 10 centavos to P33.70.

Both ALI and SMPH had foreign selling of P40 million and P28 million, respectively.

Net foreign selling amounted to P325 million on foreign buying of P2.036 billion and foreign selling of P2.361 billion, with a value turnover of P4.571 billion with 116 gainers, 97 losers, and 46 shares unchanged.

PLDT was down by P33 to P1,235 with foreigners selling P102 million out of its P170 million trade, while Converge also dropped by 18 centavos to P18.82 with P112.55 million in trade. Market bellwether SM Investments gained P19 to P939 despite foreign selling of P102 million.

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