SINGAPORE (March 31): Singapore stocks ended lower on Thursday, surrendering gains made a day earlier after a US Federal Reserve statement pared expectations for interest rate hikes.
At 5.05pm, the Straits Times Index was down 1.1%, or 31.88 points, at 2,840.69 -- a 1.3% quarterly loss.
Among other STI components, Hutchison Port Holdings Trust lost 4.9%, Jardine Cycle & Carriage fell 2.5% and CapitaLand Commercial Trust slipped 2.3%. Meanwhile, StarHub put on 0.9%, SGX added 0.6% and ST Engineering gained 0.3%.
In the broader market, decliners beat advancers 224 to 161. A total of 2.352 billion shares worth $1.328 billion changed hands, giving an average price of about 57 cents per share for the entire market.
Cedar Strategic, Spackman Entertainment Group, LionGold, MFS Tech and YuuZoo were among the most actively traded counters.
Yuuzoo ended 19% higher after it sealed an agreement with Alibaba Sports Group to organise the AliSports World Electronic Sport Games (WESG) and manage the E-Sports Clubs Competition Center for Alibaba in China.
Envictus closed 8.2% higher, triggering a query from Singapore Exchange about the surge in its share price. Analysts say the heightened interest could be related to its initial agreement to acquire 85% of Lyndarahim Ventures, the operator of Malaysia's San Francisco Coffee chain, for 24 million ringgit ($6.1 million). Envictus had a March 28 deadline to sign the final deal with sellers Prinsip Lagenda and Abdul Rahim Bin Mohd., leading the analysts to think that the market was expecting an announcement from the firm.
KS Energy ended 10% lower after its auditors raised concerns over the ability of the firm to continue as a going concern. At the group level, KPMG says current liabilities exceeded current assets by $349.9 million, mainly due to a reclassification of certain bank loans to "current liabilities" as a result of breaches in certain loan covenants.
Stratech Group finished 9.4% lower after it flagged a net loss for FY2016 stemming from lower revenue arising from the late award of several projects which the group had expected to start earlier.
Noble Group ended 3.2% lower, despite announcing that it had formed a new coal procurement joint venture with Japanese utility company Shikoku Electric Power.