Singapore stocks snapped 5-day decline on Friday and rose 1 percent, in line with a rally in regional equities as strong U.S. earnings and a step forward in the U.S. Congress on tax reform boosted global risk appetite.
MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan rose 0.1 percent on Friday after the S&P 500 advanced 0.82 percent overnight.
The U.S. House of Representatives approved a broad package of tax cuts sought by President Donald Trump, passing its first, if smallest, hurdle and providing a catalyst for fresh buying in risk assets.
At 0350 GMT, the Straits Times Index gained 1.06 percent or 36 points to 3,376. It ended 0.81 percent lower on Thursday, taking the year-to-date performance to about 16 percent.
United Overseas Bank advanced 1.1 percent while Oversea-Chinese Bank and DBS Group Holdings gained 1.2 percent each.
Telecom stocks recovered from previous day's fall: StarHub was up 1.8 percent while Singapore Telecommunications rose 0.3 percent.
Spackman Entertainment rose 1.8 percent after the company said it has invested about US$225,000 as seed funding in the Korean film production firm The Makers Studio.
But Cruise operator Genting Hong Kong fell 4 percent after its unit Star NCLC entered has agreed to sell 5 million shares in Norwegian Cruise Line Holdings to third party investors for US$270.1 million.
Shares in Raffles Education fell as much as 12.5 percent to S$0.28 on Friday after billionaire shareholder Oei Hong Leong withdrew application to remove Founder and Chief Executive Chew Hua Seng from the firm.
About 1 billion shares worth S$628 million changed hands, with gainers outnumbering losers 234 to 123.
