Philippine bourse sustains uptrend on bargain hunting

The Philippine stock market extended its gains further on Tuesday on more bargain hunting.

The bellwether Philipine Stock Exchange index rose by 0.33 percent or 25.03 points to 7,598.29, while the broader all-share index added 0.28 percent or 12.28 points to 4,348.81.

Trading volume reached 11.77 billion shares worth 8.19 billion Philippine pesos (179.52 million U.S. dollars), with 106 stocks declining, 69 advancing and 46 were unchanged.

Two of the six counters bucked the trend. These were the services and the mining and oil sectors.

"There has been a lot of overriding concerns, particularly from external sources that investors can't help but pay attention to," analyst Justino Calaycay of Accord Capital Equities Corp. said in his daily stock market comment.

The result, he said, was an increasing degree of apprehension, or caution, that has been incorporated into trading decisions.

On Monday, the Dow Jones industrial average index fell 91.66 points following the drop in the prices of energy companies.

The question of how such external events have affected and will impact the local market has been the focus for the past weeks.

"We started the year pregnant with optimism. Externally, we were aware of the risks posed by Greece (and) that of our neighbors in Asia specifically China and Japan as both economies continued to struggle against their respective problems of slower growth and deflation, respectively," Calaycay said.

As such, investors remain uncertain whether to be aggressive again in buying local shares.

Stocks in the 30-company index were mostly up. These include Globe Telecom, Inc., Metropolitan Bank and Trust Co., and Manila Electric Co.