ILOILO City – The Philippine stock market continued its precarious slide this week, as it closed slightly below 7,100 points on the index.
The market’s sluggish performance was driven partly by the 6.7 percent September inflation rate and partly by news reports about President Rodrigo Duterte’s possible health problems.
Technical analyst Hernan Segovia reports that although the reported inflation rate was below the 6.8 percent to 7.0 percent expectations, 6.7 percent was still very bad, and the investors – both local and foreign – are concerned that the economy is not going to recover quickly enough.
He also added that going forward, the threshold to watch out for is 7,000. Should the index fall below that number, it could pull the stock market down even further.
“We need a positive catalyst,” Segovia said about the need for good news for traders, “and without it we might see the market dipping down to 6,700 to 6,800 points.”
Talking about the market’s current condition, Segovia added that the weakness of the market does not bode well for the investors and traders going forward.
“This is the second time the market entered bear line territory; the first time being at 7,280 after prolonged consolidation,” Segovia said, and stated that a third dip into bearish territory, an investment term to describe a weakening market/economy, will have serious consequences for investors and businesses./PN
