SG Morning Highlights | Seatrium Bags S$11 Billion in FPSO Contracts from Petrobras

Advancers / Decliners is 78 to 53, with 71.93 million securities worth S$81.57 million changing hands.

Morgan Stanley has identified DBS, OCBC, Singtel, Sembcorp, and Genting as the top picks for investors in Singapore's equity market. The bank stated that investing in businesses with a focus on AI tech diffusion and corporate restructuring will outperform over the medium-term. With heavy outflows since 2022, Singapore's equity market currently provides attractive valuations and high-dividend yields of more than 5%. The bank also recommended placing big bets on companies undergoing corporate restructuring to make them more competitive. Morgan Stanley is optimistic about the bank sector, which offers the highest dividend yields among large-cap stocks, as well as selected names within the Telecoms, Consumer Discretionary, and Utilities sectors.

Singapore's industrial leasing volume declined by 7.7% year-on-year, reaching 2,866 tenancies in Q1 2024, due to weak global trade demand. The decline was seen across all industrial segments, particularly in single-user factories, which fell 11.3% from last year. Furthermore, the vacancy rate reached a new record high of 12.2% in the single-user factory segment during this period. Despite the growing vacancy, Savills expects rents for some segments to rise this year, especially in the prime warehouse and logistics segments. This is due to the rise in "tenancy of last resort" as SMEs shift down to lower-cost industrial building types. However, Savills also predicts that rental growth will slow down due to an expected 3.7 million sq.ft net lettable area, which is 48% higher than the average of the last four years.