SONA minimal effect on stock market

President Rodrigo Duterte says he is still up for the federalism shift during an interview with the media after his Monday’s State of the Nation Address at the Batasang Pambansa. PCOO
President Rodrigo Roa Duterte delivers his 4th State of the Nation Address at the House of Representatives in Quezon City on July 22, 2019. KING RODRIGUEZ/PRESIDENTIAL PHOTO

PRESIDENT Duterte’s latest State of the Nation Address (SONA) had a minimal effect on the Philippine stock market. Despite the wide ranging topics covered during the speech, the PSE (Philippine Stock Exchange) Composite Index barely changed from its present position of around 8,100 to 8,200 points.

Technical analyst and stock broker, Hernan Segovia, reported that the SONA had been a “non-event,” though some investors were quite optimistic that the SONA may lead to new and interesting developments.

“Prior to that, the market reacted positively before the SONA,” Segovia said. “Right on the SONA, it just fell flat.”

According to Segovia, the only companies affected by the SONA speech were ABS-CBN and Jollibee. According to Segovia, there had been no mention of ABS-CBN’s franchise during the SONA, so investors took this as a positive sign that ABS-CBN was no longer being targeted by Duterte.

Likewise, Jollibee’s stock fell several points last week over the “endo” issue, but then sharply went up when the President vetoed the “endo bill” last week. Other than these two companies’ however, last week’s SONA had no effect on the PSEi.

“The market just shrugged it off and it’s a non-event. And I think the market is still very much positive on the ‘Build Build Build’ project,” Segovia said./PN

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