Singapore shares down

Singapore share prices closed 0.68 percent lower on Wednesday, weighed down by falls in blue chip Singapore Telecommunications (SingTel) and heavyweight banking stocks, dealers said. The Straits Times Index declined 14.73 points to 2,160.47 on volume of 526 million shares valued at 637 million Singapore dollars (386 million US), down from 651 million shares worth 811 million Singapore dollars on Tuesday. Losers led gainers 282 to 128 with 748 stocks unchanged. "The banks and SingTel dragged the market down," a dealer from a local brokerage said.
DBS, Southeast Asian largest lender, slipped 20 cents to 14.20 dollars while United Overseas Bank closed 20 cents lower at 14.40.
However, Oversea-Chinese Banking Corp, the smallest of Singapore's three domestic banks, rose 20 cents to 14.00 dollars. SingTel shed six cents to 2.62 dollars ahead of the pending reduction in its weighting on the Morgan Stanley Capital International (MSCI) Singapore Index at the end of this month, a dealer said.
Among other blue chips, Singapore Airlines and publisher Singapore Press Holdings were unchanged at 11.60 and 4.32 dollars, respectively, while ST Engineering dropped a cent to 2.43.
Tech stocks were mostly lower with Venture Corp off 10 cents to 14.50 dollars, STATS ChipPAC easing three cents to 1.14, UTAC was down a cent to 60.5 cents and Datacraft falling one US cent to 1.01 US dollars. Consumer electronics maker Creative Technology was flat at 13.30 dollars, while Chartered Semiconductor rose two cents to 1.17.