Thai share prices likely to trade narrowly

Thai share prices are expected to trade narrowly next week as investors wait with caution amid new uncertainties over Thai politics and high oil prices, dealers said.
"The stock market will be overshadowed by political uncertainties, and investors will be very cautious about trading because nobody knows what will happen next," said Thanomsak Saharatchai, a senior market analyst at Capital Normura Securities.
Anti-government protesters announced Friday they would renew their street demonstrations next week in a fresh bid to force Thai Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra to leave office.
Protesters had staged months of demonstrations earlier this year, accusing Thaksin of corruption in a tax-free stock sale that earned his family 1.9 billion dollars.
Thaksin, 56, called snap elections on April 2 in hopes of ending the protests, but the polls proved inconclusive after the opposition staged a boycott. The Constitutional Court has since invalidated the results.
The protesters had called off their street demonstrations in early April, after Thaksin agreed to temporarily leave office.
But he returned to his job seven weeks later, after the court tossed out the polls and cleared the way for new elections tentatively set for October 15.
Meanwhile, Thai prosecutors on Thursday asked the court to disband Thaksin's ruling party and its main rival over election violations in the campaigning for the April vote.
If found guilty, the court could dissolve the parties and bar Thaksin from forming a new one for five years - a move analysts said could plunge the kingdom's young democracy back into turmoil.
Investors were also waiting to see what direction oil prices will take, and for the outcome of a meeting between the EU and Iran over the Islamic republic's nuclear program, Thanomsak said.
"Some positive factors are expectations that the Chinese yuan could strengthen further and that Japan could increase interest rates for the first time in six years. Such moves would encourage capital inflow to the Asian region," he told AFP
For the week to July 7, the Stock Exchange of Thailand composite index gained 7.98 points or 1.18 percent to close at 686.11.
Thanomsak said the market was expected to trade in a range of 670.00-695.00 points next week.