KUALA LUMPUR, Aug 13 — Shares on Bursa Malaysia closed broadly higher today with the benchmark FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) finished at its best of 1,858.04 points, spurred by buying in small-capitalised stocks and selected blue-chips.

The key index rose 7.65 points from yesterday’s close of 1,850.39 points with Petronas Gas as the biggest contributor to the rise. The counter added 52 sen to RM22.22 with 1.16 million lots transacted.

The bourse managed to maintain its gains from yesterday despite the mixed performance of its regional peers, following the overnight weak performance on Wall Street and the subdued Chinese inflation.

Inter-Pacific Research Sdn Bhd Head of Research, Pong Teng Siew, said the 30-index linked counters were not performing well recently as the institutional tended to make some portfolio reshuffling.

“Non-Composite Index stocks did well today amid the return of foreign investors who did not expect external factors to impact Malaysia’s market,” he told Bernama here today.

On the scoreboard, the Finance Index rose 12.23 points to 17,183.17, Industrial Index improved 40.45 points to 3,233.24 and Plantation Index perked 30.06 points to 8,944.78.

The FBM Emas Index was 54.43 points higher at 13,022.93, FBMT100 Index increased 51.68 points to 12,579.34, the FBM 70 advanced 58.68 points to 14,365.18 and the FBM Ace soared 83.71 points to 7,206.97.

Market breadth was positive with advancers trouncing losers by 544 to 313, while 305 counters were unchanged, 457 untraded and 13 others suspended.

Total volume expanded to 3.61 billion units worth RM2.68 billion from 3.01 billion units worth RM2.21 billion today.

Among actives, PDZ Holdings and Frontken gained 2.5 sen each to 27 sen and 19.5 sen respectively, and Sumatec Resources added one sen to 54 sen.

MAS inched up half-a-sen to 26 sen.

Of the heavyweights, TNB rose 14 sen to RM12.22, Public Bank perked two sen to RM19.02, CIMB added one sen to RM6.93 while Maybank was flat at RM9.94. Axiata, however, slipped two sen to RM6.95.

The Main Market volume increased to 2.84 billion units worth RM2.53 billion from the 2.48 billion units worth RM2.1 billion today.

Turnover on the ACE market rose to 684.72 million shares valued at RM135.16 million from yesterday’s 492.49 million shares valued at RM103.24 million.

Warrants advanced to 45.45 million units worth RM6.75 million from 21.68 million units worth RM3.09 million previously.

Consumer products accounted for 197.74 million shares traded on the Main Market, industrial products 496.72 million, construction 135.61 million, trade and services 1.57 billion, technology 99.13 million, infrastructure 16.19 million, SPAC 38.89 million, finance 62.63 million, hotels 2.6 million, properties 186.17 million, plantations 25.71 million, mining 44,000, REITs 10.34 million, and closed/fund 5,800. — Bernama