KUALA LUMPUR, Feb 27 — Share prices on Bursa Malaysia ended the morning session mixed, supported by continued buying interest in plantation and finance counters, dealers said.

At the lunch break, the benchmark FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) gained 6.33 points to 1,828.88, after hovering between 1,823.51 and 1,829.7.

A dealer said sentiment remained weak ahead of the testimony of US Federal Reserve chief Janet Yellen on the recent run of soft US data.

On the scoreboard, the Finance Index added 75.07 points to 16,479, the Plantation Index gained 96.02 points to 8,806.47, and the Industrial Index rose 2.4 points to 3,135.96.

The FBM Emas Index improved 30.84 points to 12,624.34, the FBMT100 Index gained 36.61 points to 12,299.38, the FBM 70 increased 17.70 points to 13,728.68 while the FBM Ace lost 9.42 points to 6,615.14.

Losers outnumbered gainers 416 to 289, with 292 counters unchanged, 634 untraded and 33 others suspended.

Turnover totalled 1.16 billion shares worth RM807.01 million.

Among actives, Nexgram Holdings rose 0.5 sen to 15.5 sen while Asia Bioenergy and Malaysia Airlines were each flat at 13.5 sen and 25.5 sen respectively.

Of the heavyweights, Maybank added 2 sen to RM9.67, Tenaga Nasional rose 4 sen to RM11.98 and CIMB earned 19 sen to RM7.09. — Bernama