Friday October 10, 07:41 AM
SE Asian Stocks-Thai, Philippine sink 8 pct; Jakarta stays shut
SINGAPORE, Oct 10 (Reuters) - Indonesia opted to extend a two-day suspension of its stock market on Friday, avoiding a sell-off as Thai and Philippine stocks plunged more than 8 percent.
At 0615 GMT, the Thailand stocks index was 8 percent lower while the Philippines extended earlier losses to drop 8.3 percent, due to concerns the world was headed closer to a recession after Wall Street plunged overnight.
'It's not about technicals, it is not about fundamentals, it's about sentiment,' said Richard Oleta, a broker with A.T De Castro Securities in Manila.
'It is a period of pessimism but then again there is always light at the end of the tunnel. But you'll never know how long the tunnel will be,' he said.
Singapore's Straits Times Index fell 7.1 percent in afternoon trading to 1,953.7 points, after a 7.5 percent drop earlier as the city-state sunk into its first recession in six years, government estimates showed on Friday.
Malaysian stocks declined 3.2 percent percent, while Vietnam lost 4.7 percent.
Indonesia dropped plans to reopen its stock market on Friday morning after a two-day suspension and despite policy makers unveiling new measures aimed at calming fears that Southeast Asia's largest economy faced a new crisis.
A sharp drop in Indonesian stocks earlier in the week had prompted authorities to suspend trading since Wednesday.
In Thailand, the Bank of Ayudhya fell 18 percent and top developer Land & House fell 13.6 percent, while in the Philippines, Lepanto Consolidated Mining fell 18.5 percent and Metro Bank lost 10.7 percent.
(Reporting by Daryl Loo in SINGAPORE and Karen Lema in MANILA; Editing by Kevin Lim)
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