KUALA LUMPUR, Oct 23 — Shares on Bursa Malaysia ended the morning session broadly higher today, spurred by buying interest in selected blue chips and oil and gas-related stocks, dealers said.

At the lunch break, the FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) rose 10.39 points to 1,813.97, after fluctuating between 1,805.64 and 1,815.46 during the morning trading.

Petronas Gas surged 72 sen to RM23.58, SapuraKencana chalked up 22 sen to RM4.30, Genting bolstered 32 sen to RM10.50, while Petronas Dagangan soared 48 sen to RM30.78.

All these counters contributed to a total of 7.944 to the benchmark index.

A dealer said the local bourse was lifted by positive sentiment regionally following the overnight gains on Wall Street as investors anticipate that the Federal Reserve will maintain its monetary stimulus measures.

On the scoreboard, the Finance Index added 2.25 points to 16,837.36, the Industrial Index increased 16.36 points to 3,116.72, and the Plantation Index rose 40.51 points to 8,469.52.

The FBM Emas Index chalked up 57.59 points to 12,615.68, the FBMT100 Index advanced 57.14 points to 12,342.39, the FBM 70 was 10.49 points higher at 14,357.26, but the FBM Ace slipped 7.29 points to 5,555.67.   

Gainers thumped losers 408 to 270, with 324 counters unchanged, 621 untraded and 15 others suspended.

Volume stood at 987.056 billion shares worth RM960.563 million.

Among actives, China Stationery gained 1.5 sen to 23.5 sen, Sumatec inched up half-a-sen to 9.5 sen and Xidelang perked 2.5 sen to 38 sen.

Of the heavyweights, CIMB rose five sen to RM7.64, while Maybank, Axiata Group and Petronas Chemicals were all flat at RM9.95, RM6.91 and RM7.11 respectively.

However, Sime Darby slipped three sen to RM9.55. — Bernama