Philippine stocks ended higher on Monday after five days of losses as players returned to the market to seek stocks looking oversold such as dominant phone firm PLDT and top conglomerate Ayala Corp.
Philippine Long Distance Telephone Co (PLDT), which fell more than 8 percent over the past five sessions, rose 1.15 percent or 20 pesos to 1,345 pesos. It was the most active stock and accounted for 25 percent of total trade.
Ayala Corp, which has interests in property, telecommunications, and banking, rose 3.33 percent or 20 centavos to 6.20 pesos after dropping more than 6 percent in the last six days.
"It's a technical bounce from last week's decline. Generally, the outlook is positive going into the last quarter on expectations that corporate earnings would beat estimates this year," said Asiasec Equities research head Oliver Plana. The main index ended 1.24 percent or 20.86 points higher at 1,702.21 points. The market is up 18 percent so far this year.
Value turnover dipped to 658 million pesos ($11.7 million) from Friday's 756.32 million pesos, as gainers beat losers 34 to 27.
Analysts said the positive sentiment was due to expectations of faster economic growth this year after the government raised its GDP growth forecast to 5.9-6.1 percent from an earlier target of 4.9-5.8 percent.
"These factors are contributing to the market's optimism," Plana said. "It's likely the market may continue to rise tomorrow. This week, we're looking at the market moving up or down 25-30 points from the 1,700 level." Globe Telecom Inc, the country's second-largest phone firm, rose 15 pesos or 1.49 percent, to 1,020 pesos. SM Prime Holdings Inc jumped 1.67 percent or 10 centavos to 6.10 pesos.