Jakarta Index Opens Lower

Jakarta, Oct 4 (Antara) - The Jakarta composite share price index opened 6.06 points lower on Monday as domestic economic data did not improve as expected. The index of the Indonesian Stock Exchange (BEI) fell 0.14 percent to 4,426.53 points with the index of 45 most liquid stocks down 0.21 percent to 737.74 points. "The domestic economic data gave negative sentiment that weakened the BEI index," Trust Securities` chief researcher Reza Priyambada said . Reza said regional factors contributed more to the pressure that cause the negative sentiment on the BEI index. A team of technical analysts from Mandiri Sekuritas said rupiah weakening and profit taking by foreign investors had put pressure on the BEI index. "The trend followed the deficit recorded in the country`s international and labor strike last week." the team said. Regional market such as Hang Seng recorded a 0.11 percent gain in index to 23,274.76 points with Nikkei-225 index down 0.88 percent to 14,201.57 points and that of Straits Times , up 0.23 percent to 3,208.78 points. Meanwhile, the national currency rupiah weakened 15 points in the opening trade on Monday . In the first minutes of trading on Monday morning rupiah traded at 11,350 per US dollar in interbank transactions losing from last weekend trading level of 11,335 per dollar. Reza Priyambada said the result of the meeting of the US Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) AS showed no improvement that put greater pressure on rupiah. "The US government, which did not announce the impact of partial government shutdown in the FOMC meeting raised question that investors chose to put their money in safe haven including the US dollar," Reza said. The inflation in October of 0.09 percent though lower compared with a year earlier has no significant effect on rupiah. In addition, the deficit of US$657.2 million in October after a small surplus in September added to the pressure on rupiah, he said. Ruly Nova, a financial market analyst from Bank Himpunan Saudara said progress made to cut unemployment and in manufacture index in the United States strengthen the US dollar facing the majority of the world currencies. "Optimism prevails among the market players about the US economy that cut in monetary stimulus may come earlier than expected," Ruly said. He said the Indonesian economy is not good enough to give greater confidence among the market players that they chose to hold the US dollar instead of other currencies.