Epidemic, PSEi rebalancing weigh down share prices

MANILA, Philippines — The stock market suffered heavily yesterday due to lingering concerns over the coronavirus outbreak and the latest rebalancing of the Philippine Stock Exchange index (PSEi).

The PSEi plunged by 121.12 points, or 1.63 percent, to close the week on the negative territory at 7,282.

The broader All Shares index suffered the same fate, losing 38.13 points to settle at 4,319.11.

Aside from prevailing epidemic fears, Regina Capital’s Luis Limlingan said shares closed lower yesterday as funds realigned with the latest rebalancing of the PSEi.

“The latest weighting of the PSEi takes effect on Feb. 17, and many tracker funds repositioned along with this,” he said.

All counters were down, led by the property index which nosedived by 1.66 percent. Financials, industrials and holding firms all dropped by more than one percent.

Market breadth, however, was positive as advancers edged decliners, 100 to 82, while 44 stocks were unchanged. Total value turnover stood at P6.45 billion.

Meanwhile, MSCI world equity index, which tracks shares in 49 countries, was flat. Wall Street futures   were pointing to a slightly higher open.

Earlier, Asian shares had earlier inched higher toward their second straight week of gains, helped by hopes governments will make provisions to soften the impact on their economies from the coronavirus epidemic.