Singapore's shares ended down on Monday, below the coveted 2,000-point level, as expectations of a rate rise in the United States and high oil prices prompted investors to book profits on recent gains.
The Straits Times Index lost 15.45 points, or 0.77 percent, to 1,988.11 after gaining 2 percent last week and breaching 2,000 to levels not seen since November 2000.
It was the biggest percentage loss in a day since August 13, when the index fell 0.81 percent. Since August 14, the index has been on an uptrend with only brief bouts of profit-taking.
In the broader market, losers led gainers 246 to 121 in moderate volumes of 545 million shares.
Dealers said investors turned cautious ahead of a policy-setting meeting of the Federal Reserve on Tuesday in which the US central bank is expected to raise its key interest rates by about a quarter percentage point to 1.75 percent.
New York Mercantile Exchange's crude oil futures for October rose to their highest in about a month on Monday, souring sentiment in Singapore Airlines, whose shares fell 1.7 percent to S$11.30. Oil accounts for a fifth of the airline's operating cost.
A dealer at a local brokerage said a close below the 1,990 point level, from where the market had bounced back in the past two sessions, could be a technical signal of more losses.
The top losers were led by financial stocks such as index-heavy United Overseas Bank which fell 2.2 percent to S$13.50, off a one-month high of S$13.80 hit last week.
However, Singapore Press Holdings (SPH) maintained its uptrend, gaining close to half a percent to S$4.80, its highest close since April 2002.
SPH announced on Friday it will merge its TV operations with MediaCorp in a new company to cut its broadcasting losses.
SPH has accumulated losses of some S$180 million since its two free-to-air TV channels were launched in 2000.
J.P. Morgan raised its target price for SPH shares, saying the deal will boost earnings.
The US investment bank said in a note to clients that it had raised its 6-month price target for the city-state's biggest publisher to S$5.10 per share from an earlier target of S$4.37.
The top gainer was, however, land transportation group ComfortDelgro Corp Ltd that rose close to 4 percent to S$1.36 on speculation of looming consolidation in Singapore's struggling rail sector.
J.P. Morgan, which maintains an "overweight" recommendation on the stock, raised its 12-month price target on ComfortDelgro's shares on Monday to S$1.46 from S$1.30, citing the possibility of consolidation in the industry.