SINGAPORE: Most Southeast Asian markets gained on Thursday as strong commodity and oil prices buoyed sentiment, while a selloff in the Philippines saw the index closing at it lowest in nearly a year.
Philippine shares pared earlier sharp losses to close down 1.4 percent at its lowest since April 2017.
The index is down over 10 percent so far this year, the region's worst performer.
SM Investments Corp and JG Summit Holdings Inc fell 2.2 percent and 3.9 percent, respectively.
"In the past few days, we have been seeing heavy foreign selling, reflecting market concerns about rising inflation. Investors are waiting to see how the government will address these concerns," said Jonathan Ravelas, chief market strategist at BDO Unibank.
Early this month, Governor Nestor Espenilla signalled a near-term rate hike might be on the cards after inflation accelerated at its fastest pace in five years in March.
The large-scale selling seen in the past few days continued, with net foreign selling for the day at 2.66 billion pesos ($51.06 million).
Broad-based losses in Vietnamese shares dragged the index down 3.9 percent, extending losses for a fourth session in five.
Vingroup JSC plummeted 6.9 percent. On Tuesday, sources indicated the company is looking to list its residential property business, to raise as much $2 billion.
Most resource stocks in other regional markets responded positively to rising metal and oil prices, with MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan gaining 0.9 percent.
Thai shares jumped 1.3 percent, up for an eighth session in nine, on strong gains in oil-related stocks.
PTT Exploration and Production PCL and PTT PCL rose 8.6 percent and 5.5 percent, respectively.
Malaysian shares climbed 0.8 percent to mark a record closing high.
"We remain positive on Malaysian equities in 2018... due to solid macro and consumption growth, continuing foreign inflows amidst positive earnings revisions, better corporate balance sheets with dividend upside, election rally," said Tushar Mohata, Nomura head of Malaysia equity research.
Nomura Research expects this upward trend to continue, and
forecast a target of 1,920 points for KLSE by year end.
Singapore shares rose 1.2 percent to a 12-week high, helped by robust gains in financials.
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