Market roundup-Bloomberg
S S&P 500 Falls to 2-Month Low as Banks Tumble on JPMorgan: as a slump in banks driven by JPMorgan Chase & Co.'s $2 billion trading loss overshadowed an increase in a gauge of consumer confidence. JPMorgan's chief investment office, run by Ina Drew, 55, took flawed positions on synthetic credit securities that remain volatile and may cost an additional $1 billion this quarter or next. The S&P 500 slid 0.3 percent . It capped a two-week drop, falling 3.6 percent in the period. The Dow Jones Industrial Average lost 0.3 percent,

Oil Drops to 2012 Low on Chinese Output, Europe Debt: Crude for June delivery fell 95 cents to $96.13 a barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange, the lowest settlement since Dec. 19. Prices slipped 2.4 percent this week and are down 2.7 percent this year. Oil in New York may extend losses after settling below the 200-day moving average for the first time since Dec. 19.

European Stocks Gain as U.S. Consumer Sentiment Climbs: U.S., consumer confidence rose in May to the highest level in four years, indicating falling fuel costs are helping households look past weaker employment growth. The Thomson Reuters/University of Michigan preliminary index of consumer sentiment climbed to 77.8, the highest since January 2008, from 76.4 the prior month. France's CAC 40 down 0.1 percent and the U.K.'s FTSE 100 rose 0.6 percent. Germany's DAX gained 1.0 percent.

Corporate News
Chevron woos investors to build new Caltex stations: Chevron Malaysia Ltd, which seeks to open up to 100 new Caltex petrol stations in Malaysia by 2015, is actively looking for investors to establish, own and operate the stations to help meet its goal under a revamped business model.

XiDeLang eyes dual listing in Hong Kong: Malaysian listed XiDeLang Holdings Ltd, a China-based shoemaker, is eyeing a dual listing on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange, the company said, in an apparent bid to raise its valuation in line with regional peers. XiDeLang, voted by Forbes as one of Asia's best companies with under US$1 billion in revenue in 2011.

Asia-Pacific firms optimistic about growth this year: Companies across the Asia-Pacific are not yet expecting the economic problems in other parts of the world to have a major impact on their revenues, according to Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu Ltd's report entitled Justified Optimism.

-SunBiz

Commercial property loans 22.7% higher: Credit for the purchase of commercial properties in March grew by 22.7% year-on-year, raising concerns in some quarters of a potential asset bubble. This loan growth in the nonresidential sector, which includes industrial and commercial properties, was the highest followed by credit growth for the construction sector at 19.2%.

DKLS making development foray into Petaling Jaya: It recently entered into a heads of agreement with the
Selangor State Development Corp (PKNS) to embark on an RM1.5bil urban redevelopment project in Sect 17.

Slower economic growth, euro debt crisis may lift corporate default rate: Bank Negara has revised the country's economic growth projection to between 4% and 5% this year from the earlier estimate of between 5% and 6% that was announced in the Economic Report released by the Finance Ministry.The Malaysian economy grew by 5.1% last year.

-StarBiz

Westports container volume jumps: rose by 15 per cent or 6.4 million twenty foot equivalent units (TEUs) last year, compared with 5.6 million TEUs in 2010. he better-thanexpected container volume throughput comes from both transhipment and indigenous boxes, registering positive increases of 22 per cent and 13 per cent respectively.

PosLaju to make 'house calls': plans to cater to more contractual customers to maintain its position as a front runner in the local courier business. Soon, we will be introducing A new product specially for online customers. It is something like a prepaid box or prepaid parcel that they can use and send it to our post offices or PosLaju centres.

Axiata Group zooms in on target: to achieve its headline key performance indicators (KPIs) this year. Axiata missed all of its headline KPIs for 2011, including on revenue (KPI: 10 per cent growth; Actual: 5.3 per cent) and on earnings before interest, tax, depreciation and amortisation or Ebitda (KPI: 10.3 per cent; Actual: 1 per cent).

-Btimes

Source:Jupiter Secutities Research 11 May 2012