Sharp gains in US, Japanese stocks lift local share prices

Share prices closed 1.38 percent higher yesterday as sharp gains in the US and Japanese stock markets lifted investor sentiment locally, dealers said.

The Philippine Stock Exchange composite index rose 28.71 points to 2,114.89 after trading between 2,086.18 and 2,115.73. Volume was 1.35 billion shares worth P909 million.

The broader all-shares index advanced 13.79 points to 1,278.57.

Gainers beat losers 50 to 27 and 59 stocks were flat.

"The government, with the broader and higher value-added tax, will have more leeway in spurring economic growth," said Pomento, a director of research. He expects the index to reach 2,200 in three months.

Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co. (PLDT), the nation’s largest phone company, gained P20 or 1.2 percent, to P1755. It rose 1.2 percent this week, its first weekly gain in three.

SM Investments, which owns the nation’s largest shopping mall operator and assets of the nation’s richest tycoon Henry Sy, added P7, or 2.9 percent, to 246, stopping an eight-day, 5.4 percent retreat. The company is one of five new stocks that were included in the main index yesterday.

Stock indexes rose around Asia today, with the exception of China and Malaysia, as US reports strengthened expectations that the world’s largest economy is growing without generating inflation.

"The market momentum is fueled in part by the favorable sentiments overseas brought about by the confidence in the US economy," a major trading partner of the nation, said Mark Canizares, an analyst at CitisecOnline in Manila.

Petron jumped 30 centavos, or 7.1 percent, to P4.50. The stock’s share price may reach P6 in 12 months, according to Jody Santiago, director of research at the Manila- unit of UBS. He raised his earnings per share estimates for the Petron by 35 percent this year, 36 percent in 2006 and 38 percent in 2007.

First Philippine Holdings Corp., the nation’s largest publicly traded power producer, fell 50 centavos, or one percent, to P50. The company said a unit is in dispute with a group led by Shell Philippines Exploration BV that it owes P12.8 billion for gas it agreed to buy and didn’t use.

Shares worth P909 million traded, 21 percent less than the six-month daily average and the lowest in four days. – AFP