JCI, rupiah weaken after Paris attack

JAKARTA. The Jakarta Composite Index (JCI) weakened 30.65 points, or 0.69 percent, to 4,442.18 during Monday’s final trading session and the rupiah’s value dropped as terrorist attacks in Paris drove global investors to buy US dollars.

The rupiah weakened 0.47 percent (64 points) to Rp 13,749 per US dollar, retreating past the psychological level of 13,700. On a year-to-date basis, the rupiah depreciated 9.89 percent, less than the 20.21 percent that the Malaysian ringgit depreciated.

"Negative external sentiment became one of the things suppressing the rupiah, especially the Paris terror attack," a money market analyst at Bank Himpunan Saudara, Ruly Nova, told Antara news agency in Jakarta on Monday.

The Paris attacks, amid a slowing global economy, led traders to relocate their assets to less risky instruments, such as the US dollar.

They also anticipated that the Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) might raise the US benchmark interest rate next month.

Under such conditions, Rully continued, positive local sentiment brought about by such things as a US$1.01 billion surplus in October trade was not enough to boost the market’s appetite to buy stocks or rupiah.

The Indonesia Stock Exchange (IDX) recorded a transaction value of Rp 3.55 trillion ($256.21 billion), with a transaction volume of 3.66 billion shares. All 10 sectoral indexes were in the red zone, led by the miscellaneous industrial index, which retreated 2.29 percent.