KUALA LUMPUR, April 7 — Bursa Malaysia ended mixed today, with lower-liners down on profit-taking and blue-chips higher on follow-through buying support.

At 5pm, the benchmark FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) rose 6.29 points to 1,862.9, its highest level so far this year.

However, market breadth was negative, with losers outnumbering gainers by 452 to 372 while 298 counters were unchanged, 486 untraded and 15 others suspended.

Turnover rose to 2.12 billion shares valued at RM2.27 billion from last Friday’s 2.06 billion shares valued at RM2.83 billion.

On the scoreboard, the Industrial Index rose 8.87 points to 3,178.56 and the Plantation Index added 59.34 points to 8,933.12. The Finance Index, however, fell 34.939 points to 17,001.08.

The FBM Emas Index advanced 42.27 points to 12,885.05, FBMT100 Index 46.96 points to 12,538.71, FBM 70 70.55 points to 14,036.72 and the FBM Ace 1.42 points to 6,784.2.

External factors remained a major influence in dictating movements through the day, dealers said. A dealer said the market moved in step with regional peers following weak lead from Wall Street last week owing to selloff in biotechs and Internet companies.

“There was profit-taking today, but some bargain hunting in selected stocks eased the pressure a little bit,” he said.

The dealer said the market was likely to be steady tomorrow, particularly blue-chips, after going through selling pressure in the past few day.

Among actives, KNM-WA rose 1.5 sen to 35.5 sen, Talam Transform gained 1.5 sen to 8.5 sen and KNM fell 1.5 sen to 85 sen.

Of the heavyweights, Maybank rose 2 sen to RM9.78, Tenaga gained 34 sen to RM11.68, and CIMB added 8 sen to RM7.50.

Main market volume increased to 1.67 billion units valued at RM2.12 billion from 1.59 billion units valued at RM2.7 billion on Friday.

Turnover on the ACE market rose to 404.97 million shares worth RM133.18 million from last Friday’s 399.81 million shares worth RM113.87 million.

Warrants declined to 42.06 million units valued at RM7.75 million from 63.4 million units valued at RM15.05 million previously.

Consumer products accounted for 98.06 million shares traded on the Main Market, industrial products 416.34 million, construction 72.0 million, trade and services 498.42 million, technology 69.74 million, infrastructure 14.74 million, SPAC 11.97 million, finance 132.15 million, hotels 1.26 million, properties 336.9 million, plantations 18.01 million, mining 262,100, REITs 1.92 million and closed/fund 116,000. — Bernama