External pressures drag down index

MANILA, Philippines - External pressures weighed down on share prices yesterday, with the main index snapping a two-day climb.

The Philippine Stock Exchange index lost 0.96 percent or 70.69 points to settle at 7,314.38, while the broader all shares index shed 1.08 percent or 48.78 points to 4,485.42.

Weak factory data in world’s second largest economy China and the decline in Wall Street accounted for weaker investor sentiment.

Specifically, the HSBC Purchasing Managers’ Index for China fell to 49.6 in May. A reading below 50 suggests contraction, the first since October last year.

In Wall Street, the Dow Jones industrial average slipped 0.5 percent to close at 15,307.17 while the broader Standard & Poor’s 500 index fell 0.8 percent to 1,655.35.

US stocks reversed early gains given mixed signals from the US Federal Reserve, whose chairman Ben Bernanke said it was too early to pull out its $85-billion monthly bond purchases but minutes of the previous Fed policy meeting showed that some officials are willing to ease the stimulus program.

Locally, all counters were in the red, paced by mining and oil that sank 2.19 percent or 383.60 points to 17,138.81.

Turnover value improved to P12.14 billion from P8.8 billion on Wednesaday. Decliners dominated advancers, 148 to 33, while 34 stocks did not change.

Actively traded stocks were in the red, led by top-traded SM Investments Corp. that dropped 0.42 percent or P5 to P1,198. Other decliners were Universal Robina Corp. (-3.1 percent), Metrobank (-2.54 percent) and Ayala Land Inc. (-1.96 percent).