Wednesday, August 09, 2006

Shares seen firmer ahead of key corporate results

INQ7 MONEY - BREAKING NEWS

August 07, 2006
Updated 08:23:55 (Mla time)
Cecille Yap
Xinhua Financial News Service

SHARE prices are expected to open firmer as investors continue to snap up shares of major companies in anticipation of good quarterly results announcements this week. However, profit-taking could cut gains, dealers said.

On Friday, the composite index ended up 5.05 points or 0.21 percent at 2,362.60.

The broader all-shares index gained 1.74 points to 1,452.29.

Gainers beat losers 59 to 32, while 59 stocks were unchanged.

Volume reached 5.12 billion shares worth 1.34 billion pesos.

"The market may sustain its gains from last week for a couple more days, but soon we should be entering into a corrective consolidation mode," AB Capital Securities told clients in a note.

"With most of the major big cap issues already at overbought levels, the market's near term bias is negative."

Conglomerate Ayala Corp. and its property unit Ayala Land Inc. are scheduled to announce their second-quarter results Monday. Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co. is set to report its April-June performance Tuesday.

AB Capital said that despite lingering worries over US interest rates and the tension in the Middle East, the market's focus had shifted to corporate earnings that it said had so far been good.

"The market may turn sour if the remaining profits reports don't come out within expectations. It also begs the question whether the troubles abroad are powerful enough to offset strong earnings. We believe that the overall economy is strong, reducing the likelihood that the market will have a major meltdown," the brokerage said.

(One dollar = 51.52 pesos)

http://services.inq7.net/express/06/08/07/html_output/xmlhtml/20060807-13867-xml.html

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