Analyst Reza Priyambada said shares with big capitalization tended to be corrected and profit taking still tended to be strong preventing the index from rising higher.
Jakarta (ANTARA News) - Profit taking prevented the Jakarta composite share price index from rising higher on Thursday .

The index of the Indonesian Stock Exchange closed only 7.19 points or 0.17 percent higher at 4,356.61 points with the index of 45 most liquid stocks even down 0.22 percent to the level of 734.58 points.

Trust Securities` chief researcher Reza Priyambada said shares with big capitalization tended to be corrected and profit taking still tended to be strong preventing the index from rising higher.

However, there was still net buy of Rp138.762 billion by foreign investors giving positive sentiment to the market, Reza said.

Trading at the BEI on Thursday was recorded with 199,285 transactions and 4.449 billion shares valued at Rp4.923 trillion changing hands .

Gainers outnumbered decliners by 168 to 102 with 91 share unchanged.

Regional markets such as Hang Seng posted a 0.07 percent increase in index to 22,953.72 points with Nikkei-225 index down 0.26 percent to 14,387.27 points and that of Straits Times gaining 0.46 percent to 3,122.42 points.

Meanwhile, rupiah weakened against the US dollar losing 50 points in interbank transaction in Thursday`s closing.

Rupiah closed at 11,350 per dollar weakening from 11,300 earlier.

Financial market observer Ruly Nova of Bank Himpunan Saudara, said the rupiah would have lost more value if Bank Indonesia did not raise its benchmark interest rate (BI Rate) earlier on the day.

The Central Bank after a meeting of its Board of Governors announced its decision raising the BI Rate from 7 percent to 7.25 percent.

"The pressure on rupiah weakened after Bank Indonesia raised the benchmark interest by 25 basis points to 7.25 percent," Ruly said.

He said the increase in the BI Rrate would attract foreign investors to the country that rupiah could regain strength in the coming days.

"Rupiah could regain some of its losses to reach the level of 10,000 per dollar," he predicted.

Financial market observer Lukman Leong of PT Platon Niaga Berjangka, predicted rupiah is ripe for a pullback with inflation tending to decline and current account expected to improve. (*)

Editor: Heru Purwanto
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