PSEi plunges back to 8,800

Philippine share prices fell by more than 1 percent to return to the 8,800 level on the PSEi Thursday, dragged by profit-taking, regional concerns, and net selling by foreign investors.

The bellwether PSEi fell 107.04 points or 1.20 percent to close at 8,813.25. The broader All Shares lost 42.76 points or 0.83 percent to 5,101.41.

“It’s weakness of regional markets which might be due to news that China won't increase its US bond investments anymore. Also some profit-taking,” April Lynn Tan, COL Financial vice president and head of research, said.

China, the biggest foreign holder of US Treasuries, could slow down or stop buying government bonds, according to a report by Reuters.

“The correction of more than 100 basis points (bps), with intraday trade reaching 167 bps, is more or less expected as we have already been trading upwards since last week,” Paul Michael Angelo, stock market analyst at Regina Capital Development Corp., said in a separate email message.

The main index soared to reach a new all-time high of 8,923.72 on Tuesday, driven by positive sentiment from overseas markets.

“A healthy correction is expected until next week, before we see a bounce upward as soon as PHL GDP (gross domestic product) figures come out,” Angelo said.

The Philippine Statistics Authority (PSA) is scheduled to release the fourth-quarter and full-year 2017 GDP figures in two weeks.

Foreign funds bought P3.655 billion of shares during the session and sold P4.534 billion for a net selling position of P878.960 million.