KUALA LUMPUR, April 3 — Last-minute buying, mostly seen in the finance counters, pushed up the FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) to a high for this year, dealers said.

At 5pm, the benchmark index stood at 1,855.63, up 3.63 points, beating the previous high of 1,852.95 on January 2. The index hovered between 1,847.81 and 1,855.83 through the day.

Public Bank and Allianz Malaysia finance stocks emerged among the top gainers, adding 52 sen and 36 sen each to RM20 and RM10.70 respectively.

Public Bank, one of the heavyweight counters, contributed 2.32 points to the key benchmark index, followed by Petronas Gas, with 1.64 points, rising 46 sen to RM24.88.

Affin Investment Bank vice-president Dr Nazri Khan Adam Khan said selling was well-absorbed by the investors.

“Investors are parking sell-order at the 1,850 level,” Nazri Khan, Affin bank’s head of retail research, told Bernama. “The next immediate resistance level may be at 1,880.”

Gainers outpaced losers 420 to 415 while 336 counters were unchanged, 437 untraded and 14 others suspended.

Turnover fell to 2.12 billion shares worth RM2.81 billion from 2.35 billion shares valued at RM2.64 billion yesterday.

On the scoreboard, the Industrial Index increased 10.26 points to 3,209.39, the Finance Index surged 111.76 points to 16,817.3 and the Plantation Index improved 24.15 points to 8,951.57.

The FBM Emas Index gained 22.46 points to 12,856.4, the FBMT100 Index rose 21.46 points to 12,503.99, the FBM 70 jumped 12.45 points to 14,03.36, but the FBM Ace fell 5.87 points to 6,770.35. Among actives, Ingenuity Consolidated lost 1 sen to 8.5 sen, Xidelang shed 2 sen to 25 sen, but Asian Pac rose 2 sen to 23.5 sen and Insas earned 1 sen to RM1.32.

As for heavyweights, Maybank added 1 sen to RM9.68, CIMB was 4 sen higher at RM7.25, but Tenaga Nasional lost 44 sen to RM11.30 and Axiata slipped 2 sen to RM6.71.

Main market volume narrowed to 1.58 billion units worth RM2.66 billion from 1.69 billion units valued at RM2.49 billion yesterday.

Turnover on the ACE market fell to 500.4 million shares worth RM136 million from yesterday’s 610.62 million shares valued at RM137.58 million.

Warrants advanced to 38.67 million units valued at RM9.29 million from 37.81 million units worth RM8.34 million yesterday.

Consumer products accounted for 246.76 million shares traded on the Main Market, industrial products 233.68 million, construction 83.67 million, trade and services 441.24 million, technology 77.21 million, infrastructure 11.25 million, SPAC 63.51 million, finance 104.86 million, hotels 473,000, properties 296.99 million, plantations 15.78 million, mining 58,100, REITs 6.63 million and closed/fund 94,700. — Bernama