Jakarta Index Gaining On Friday

Jakarta, Sept 27 (Antara) - The Jakarta composite share price index opened stronger in the Friday`s morning trade to follow the trend in global market. The Index of the Indonesian Stock Exchange (BEI) opened at 4,436.76 points or 0.7 percent higher than in Thursday`s closing with index of 45 most liquid stock up 1.07 percent to 743.38 points. "The majority of markets in Asia strengthened this morning buoyed by gain recorded in the US market," Samuel Sekuritas` analyst Benedictus Agung said here on Friday. However, plantation stocks could halt further increase in the BEI index with the falling price of crude palm oil (CPO), Benedictus said . Head of Research of PT VAlbury Asia Securities Alfiansyah said The Fed stimulus tapering off is still a threat to global market any time to come though not in short term. "US economic data are not all positive in the past several months," Alfiansyah said. He said The Fed has always said it would reduce its stimulus when the US economic condition improve with unemployment down to 6.5 percent and inflation cut to 2.5 percent . Regional markets such as Hang Seng recorded a 0.46 percent increase in index to 23,231.70 points with Nikkei-225 index down 0.01 percent to 14,797.05 points and that of Straits Times gaining 0.68 percent to 3,216.14 points. Meanwhile, rupiah lost more value against the US dollar at Friday opening session on negative external sentiment. The currency traded at 11,445 per US dollar in inter-bank transactions weakening from the previous level of 11,395 . Monex Investindo Futures` analyst Zulfirman Basir said fundamentally rupiah is still vulnerable with market still worried about The Fed cutting its monetary stimulus. "In addition, investors chose to wait and see what would come out from negotiations on US debt ceiling," Zulfirman said. The US government and the Congress have yet to reach a compromise on the debt ceiling. The US government proposed increase in debt ceiling to allow it to seek more debt to meet the government bills but the Congress is against increasing debt. The players in the domestic financial market were also wary of the country`s economic condition ahead of the announcement of various economic data such as inflation and trade balance early next month. Ruly Nova, a financial market observer from Bank Himpunan Saudara predicted rupiah would remain stable thanks to intervention by Bank Indonesia. "The sentiment at present tends to be negative , therefore, Bank Indonesia is expected to remain in the market," Ruly said. Indonesian economic data to be released early next month could bring about positive sentiment to the domestic market, he said He said improvement in inflation and trade balance could serve to cushion the impact of negative external factors. The government has been more serious in coping with current account deficit, he added.