The stock market fell Monday on thin trading to end a four-day rally, as investors cashed in on recent gains.
The Philippine Stock Exchange Index dropped 29.74 points, or 0.4 percent, to 7,369.44 on a value turnover of P4.3 billion. Losers beat gainers, 90 to 82, with 55 issues unchanged.
Metro Pacific Investments Corp., which is into toll roads, water and electricity distribution, power generation and hospitals, declined 3.1 percent to P4.43, while SM Investments Corp. of retail tycoon Henry Sy Sr. lost 1.6 percent to P901.
Megawide Construction Corp., which expanded the Mactan-Cebu International Airport, slipped 1.8 percent to P19.04, while Transpacific Broadband Group International Inc., which is bidding to become the country’s third major telecommunications firm, tumbled 7.4 percent to P0.50.
The rest of Asian markets mostly fell Monday as data showed that China’s economic growth slowed in the second quarter on the brink of a potential trade war with the United States.
After a positive end to last week’s roller-coaster ride for equities, investors shifted back into defensive mode in early business, with concerns about the impact of tit-for-tat tariffs on the world’s top two economies.
Beijing said growth in April-June came in at 6.7 percent, in line with forecasts in an AFP survey and better than the government’s annual target but a shade down from the previous three months.
While the reading refers to the three months before US levies on billions of dollars of Chinese goods were imposed, observers had already said the country was likely to struggle with a trade face-off as leaders battle a debt mountain and pollution.
At the same time, the yuan and local stock markets are tumbling.
News Friday that China’s trade surplus with the US, a major cause of Trump’s anger, hit a record in June has further fuelled tensions.
Mao Shengyong, a spokesman for the national statistics bureau, warned that the trade row “will have an impact on the economies of both China and the United States, and now that the world economy is deeply integrated, and the industrial chain is globalized, many related countries will also be affected.”
Shanghai closed down 0.6 percent and Sydney eased 0.4 percent but Hong Kong ended slightly up after a late rally. Singapore, Seoul, Wellington, and Taipei were lower while Tokyo was closed for a public holiday.
There are hopes that Beijing and Washington can reach an agreement to avert an all-out trade war, with some experts optimistic at China’s relatively muted response to Donald Trump’s threats of further tariffs on $200 billion of goods.
“Should the US eventually move ahead with these tariffs, China could not escalate on an even basis given China only imports roughly $130 billion annually from the US, suggesting they would either need to levy higher trade tariffs on a small number of selected products or take the least attractive measure of tactically weakening the yuan,” said Stephen Innes, head of Asia-Pacific trading at OANDA. With AFP