Stock market falls amid heavy profit-taking

By Jenni er B. Austria

LOCAL stocks plunged Monday on profit taking after last week’s strong recovery.

The benchmark Philippine Stock Exchange index lost 74.03 points, or 1.12 percent, to close at 6,550.75.

Philstocks Financial Inc. analyst Claire Alviar said the lower-than-expected China’s gross domestic product growth in the second quarter also dampened investors’ sentiments.

“This adversely affected sentiment in Asia as many countries in the region are either China’s trading partners or have some form of connection with the country,” Alviar said.

Foreign investors remained net buyers despite the market decline. Value turnover was thin at P2.82 billion.

Other Asian markets also struggled Monday to build on last week’s rally, with new data showing China’s economy grew less than expected in the second quarter as its post-Covid recovery runs out of steam.

Equities surged last week as news that US inflation slowed more than forecast fanned hopes that the Federal Reserve would soon end its campaign of interest rate hikes.

The advance was also bolstered by pledges from Beijing to introduce stimulus measures for the struggling economy.

However, the scale of the work facing Chinese officials was laid bare Monday, with data showing gross domestic product expanded 6.3 percent on-year in April-June, much less than forecast in an AFP survey.

Growth was also sharply down on a quarter-on-quarter basis, which is seen as a better guide to the state of the