Jakarta stocks edged slightly lower on Friday, hit by profit taking following recent gains that came on the back of expectations of strong corporate earnings reports.
The composite index slipped 0.19 percent to end at 860.49 points in heavy turnover estimated at 1.3 trillion rupiah ($142.5 million). Advancers led decliners 55 to 54 while 84 issues were unchanged.
"The fall in oil prices is good but today the focus is more on corporate earnings. Investors took profit and they may shift to buy second liners next week," said Arianto Reksoprodjo, a market analyst at Trimegah Sekuritas.
Oil prices on Friday stepped back from this week's eight percent rout, holding well above $50 a barrel as analysts said it would take more than China's mild interest rate rise to stem demand growth from the world's second largest user.
Shares had risen around 2.5 percent in the last two days in anticipation of solid corporate quarterly results due on Friday. Some banks and companies had released robust results earlier this week which helped lift sentiment in the respective sectors.
Telecom bellwether PT Telekomunikasi Indonesia Tbk rose 1.16 percent to end at 4,350 rupiah after it reported net profit in the third quarter more than doubled as it wooed more mobile subscribers despite increasing competition.
The largest firm by market value said net profit in the three months ended September 30 jumped to 2.15 trillion rupiah from 0.87 trillion a year earlier. The result was at the upper end of analyst forecasts at 1.9-2.2 trillion rupiah.
Its rival in the mobile business, PT Indonesian Satellite Corp Tbk, eased 0.53 percent to 4,725 rupiah although it reported nine-month net profit more than doubled from a year earlier.
The country's largest automotive distributor PT Astra International Tbk ended down 0.63 percent at 7,850 rupiah. It reported, after the market closed, that net profit in January to September grew 7.9 percent to four trillion rupiah from a year ago.
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