the singapore exchange ends the week on a down note 1425842015

Singapore stocks continued to falter on Friday on negative cues from Chinese stock markets, the looming US interest rate hike and overnight losses on Wall Street.

Indices

The Straits Times Index (STI) ended 13.1 points or 0.46 per cent lower to 2,832.64, taking the year-to-date performance to -15.82 per cent.

The FTSE ST Mid Cap Index declined 0.04 per cent, while the FTSE ST Small Cap Index declined 0.07 per cent.

The Singapore Exchange traded a volume of 1,366.5 million shares valued at SG$1,194.9 million. Losers outnumbered gainers by 207/189.

Stocks

Rickmers Maritime (SGX:B1ZU) closed Friday at SG$0.235, up 4.44 per cent. According to the Business Times, the company’s new CEO, Soeren Andersen, is focusing on bringing in steady revenue from chartering his container ships, controlling debt, and ultimately, effecting an expansion of the company’s fleet of small and medium-sized vessels.

Frasers Hospitality Trust (SGX:ACV) lost 2.67 per cent to close at SG$0.730. The company is expanding the reach of its highly popular hotel-cum-residences hybrid hospitality offering to Europe and the Asia-Pacific, said the Business Times.

Australian heavy engineering company Civmec Ltd (SGX:P9D) announced Friday its launch of a new defence division that will likely bid for a chunk of the huge AU$50 billion (SG$49.8 billion) Australian submarine project. "Our experience means we certainly have the capability to be their in-country builder," Civmec executive chairman James Fitzgerald said in a statement.

EMAS Offshore Ltd (SGX:UQ4) fell 6.25 per cent to SG$0.225. The company announced Friday that executive director Adarash Kumar will become its new chief executive and will resign as chief operating officer and executive director of parent company Ezra Holdings Limited (SGX:5DN).

China New Town Development Co. Ltd. (SGX:D4N) fell 5.26 per cent to SG$0.054. The company announced last week that it had suspended its vice-chairman and Executive Director Shi Jian in the midst of investigations by sister company SRE Group of allegedly unauthorised transactions entered into by him, according to the Business Times.

Sunright Limited (SGX:S71) zoomed 23.81 per cent to SG$0.260. The company reported that net profit for the full year ended July 31, 2015 surged to SG$3.1 million from a mere SG$135,000 in the prior year, while revenues were flat at SG$137 million. The company recommended an ordinary dividend of 0.2 Singapore cents and a special dividend of 0.2 Singapore cents.

Economic news

Speaking at a joint press conference Friday with US President Barack Obama, Chinese President Xi Jinping said he was confident that China would record healthy economic growth in the future, as the country transited from “speed-based growth to quality-based growth,” and rebalanced from an economy that was heavily dependent on exports and government investment to one that relied on domestic consumption as the main driver.

On Wall Street Friday, the Dow was boosted by strong results from Nike Inc (NYSE:NKE) which touched an all-time high. However, the S&P 500 gave back early gains following a sell-off in biotech shares. The NASDAQ, too, was affected by a decline in the biotech index. The Dow Jones Industrial Average rose 113.35 points, or 0.7 percent, to 16,314.67, the S&P 500 lost 0.9 points, or 0.05 percent, to 1,931.34 and the Nasdaq Composite dropped 47.98 points, or 1.01 percent, to 4,686.50.