MO R N I N G C O F F E E - Tuesday, April 17, 2012



U.S. and European market roundup
DJIA rose 0.56%, to 12,921.41 at the close. U.S. retail sales for March shot up 0.8%, sharply higher than the forecast. But the Standard & Poor's 500 Index inched down 0.05%, to 1,369.57. The Nasdaq Composite Index dropped 0.76 %, to close at 2,988.40. (Reuters)

European stock markets extended gains on Monday afternoon in the wake of stronger-than-expected U.S. retail sales data, after retail spending rose 0.8% in March, against economists' expectations for a 0.4% gain. The German DAX 30 index rose nearly 1% to 6,642, and the French CAC 40 index rose 1% to 3,223.17. The FTSE 100 index rose 0.8% to 5,696.13. (MarketWatch)

Macro News
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Corporate News
CIMB Group Holdings Bhd's getting closer to acquire a nearly 60% stake in Filipino conglomerate San Miguel Corp's Bank of Commerce (BoC) is now awaiting that country's central bank approval. The unlisted banking subsidiary is the 16th largest lender by asset base in the Philippines with a 121-branch network. (StarBiz)

Bumi Armada Bhd has won a US$200mil (RM612.6mil) engineering, procurement, installation and commissioning contract via its wholly-owned subsidiary Bumi Armada Caspian LLC from Russian oil major OAO Lukoil. The project is planned to take approximately 32 months with the majority of construction work completed by the end of 2014. (StarBiz)

Affin Holdings Bhd will continue to wait for Bank Sentral Republik Indonesia (BSRI), the Indonesian central bank's formal agreement to allow Affin to hold at least a 51% stake in PT Bank Ina Perdana. Bank Ina Perdana is a smallish Indonesian bank with about 20 plus branches that Affin intends to convert into a full-fledged Islamic bank after it buys into it. (StarBiz)

Axis Real Estate Investment Trust (REIT) has reported a net profit increase of 27.1% from a year earlier to
RM20.96mil for its first quarter ended March 31, 2012, on higher revenue and property revaluation surplus. It had proposed a first interim income distribution of 4.3 sen per unit. (StarBiz)

Source:Jupiter Securities Research 17 April 2012