The stock market extended a rally Friday for the fourth straight day, boosted by gains in select blue chips.
The Philippine Stock Exchange Index added 38.76 points, or 0.5 percent, to 7,248.20 on a value turnover of P8.6 billion. Gainers and losers were even at 101 each, with 35 issues unchanged.
Globe Telecom Inc., the second-biggest telecommunications company, surged 6.2 percent to P1,684, while BDO Unibank Inc., the largest lender, rose 1.5 percent to P113.70.
International Container Terminal Services Inc., the biggest port operator, advanced 2.9 percent to P73.90, while Alliance Global Group Inc. of tycoon Andrew Tan climbed 2.3 percent to P13.40.
Petron Corp., the bigger of the two oil refineries, dropped 5.3 percent to P9.75.
Markets in Asia, meanwhile, were largely flat after a day of little change in Europe and on Wall Street, but Samsung shares were boosted as it tipped soaring profits while Toyota dipped following a threat from Donald Trump over a new vehicle plant in Mexico.
China also on Friday hiked the yuan against the dollar in its biggest one-day increase since 2005, after the greenback fell against leading currencies the previous day.
The People’s Bank of China, which has been battling to shore up the sagging yuan, fixed it at 6.8668 to the greenback, according to the China Foreign Exchange Trade System, which operates the national foreign exchange market.
The 0.92 percent hike was the strongest daily increase since July 2005, and comes after the yuan recently flirted with the 7.0 to the dollar mark, a threshold not crossed in more than eight years.
Tokyo was slightly down overall as the yen strength weighed on sentiment and following declines on Wall Street.
The US currency was trading at 115.85 yen in afternoon trade, up from its earlier low of 115.07 yen, but sharply down from 118.12 yen seen on Wednesday.
A stronger yen hurts the profitability of Japan’s major exporters, hitting demand for their shares.
Shanghai stocks also closed down less than half a percent, ending a three-day rising streak, dragged lower by a sell-off in small companies, dealers said. Hong Kong was flat in afternoon trade.
China’s currency has been under pressure from uncertainty over the health of the world’s second largest economy, massive capital outflows and the sharp rise in the dollar following Donald Trump’s election victory and anticipation of US interest rate hikes.
Beijing only allows the tightly controlled yuan to rise or fall two percent on either side of the daily fix, to prevent volatility and maintain control over the currency.
China said last week it would almost double the number of foreign currencies it uses to determine the official value of the yuan, thereby diluting the role of the dollar as authorities seek to arrest the yuan’s fall and project an image of stability in the unit.
Toyota shares dropped more than three percent at one point after Trump threatened the carmaker with import taxes over the new vehicle plant.
“Build plant in US or pay big border tax,” Trump tweeted of the company’s plans.
In a statement issued after the tweet, Toyota said it looked forward to “collaborating with the Trump administration” to serve consumer and industry interests. With AFP