ares on Bursa Malaysia ended the morning session lower today on cautious sentiment, dealers said.

At the lunch break, the benchmark FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) closed at 1,818.02, down 2.68 points, after hovering between 1,817.86 and 1,821.33.

A dealer said the local market eased after the recent rebound and amid cautious sentiment ahead of the conclusion of a two-day US Federal Reserve’s policy meeting that ends tonight and which is anticipated to further taper bond purchases.

On the scoreboard, the Finance Index lost 16.039 points 16,420.23, the Industrial Index lost 7.37 points for 3,166.62 and the Plantation Index eased 14.189 points to 8,870.11.

The FBM Emas Index was down 9.721 points to 12,596.27, the FBMT100 Index dipped 11.22 points to 12,263.66 while the FBM Ace firmed 28.86 points to 6,647.28 and the FBM 70 improved 14.109 points to 13,834.35.

Market breadth was negative, with losers outnumbering gainers 323 to 300, while 322 counters were unchanged, 675 untraded and 22 others suspended. Turnover totalled 776.45 million shares worth RM755.88 million.

Among actives, Wintoni and Sumatec were flat at 6 sen and 30 sen respectively, Xidelang added 1 sen to 38 sen and PDZ earned 0.5 sen to 11.5 sen. Asia Bioenergy slipped 0.5 sen to 9 sen.

As for the heavyweights, Maybank, CIMB and Axiata lost 1 sen each to RM9.58, RM7.04 and RM6.48 respectively. TNB and Sime Darby dropped 2 sen each to RM11.92 and RM9.19 respectively. — Bernama