The week ahead

Last week finished with a flurry of foreign buying and selling in response to the MSCI rebalance. The PSEi did P13.3 billion in value turnover with approximately P9 billion in foreign buying and P9.3 billion in foreign selling. Today is the first trading day of the “BER month” period (SeptemBER, OctoBER, NovemBER, DecemBER), which is generally the busiest period for most consumer-facing products and services.

> PH:  All eyes will be on the Philippine Statistics Authority when it announces our August consumer price index and inflation figures on Thursday morning. That’s also the start of the Petron [PCOR] preferred shares sale offer period that will run through to September 13, with a listing on September 23.

> International:  I’m interested in the US jobless claims report that we will see on Friday morning, mostly to confirm that the number is within the expected range.

MB BOTTOM-LINE:  Both DigiPlus [PLUS 22.50 ?4.0%; 346% avgVol] and International Container [ICT 396.20 ?1.7%; 178% avgVol] pulled back as the PSEi failed repeatedly to breach and hold the 7k psychological barrier. Where will these two market darlings fall if the PSEi retreats more significantly? It feels like both of these stocks (more PLUS than ICT tbh) started to attract attention from a much wider audience than usual. Is this just a momentary breather on the way to higher highs, or will there be hundreds (thousands?) of new traders nursing underwater positions for the foreseeable future? If you have never placed a trade before, please do not make PLUS or ICT your first. If you have that feeling in your heart that you’ll miss out on glorious riches if you miss this temporary window to buy, please do not make the trade. Don’t get FOMO’d into holding a position you don’t understand. It’s not inevitable that PLUS and ICT will just march up to a series of easy new highs.     

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