KUALA LUMPUR, Aug 28 — Bursa Malaysia was range-bound at mid-afternoon today, with buying interest interspersed with profit-taking, dealers said.

At 3pm, the benchmark FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) slipped 0.24 point to 1,872.14.

The local stock market was volatile after it resumed afternooon trading with blue-chips traded sideways while penny stocks saw retail participation on rotational basis.

On the scoreboard, the Finance Index firmed 2.66 points to 17,458.55 and the Industrial Index strengthened 15.59 points to 3,273.35.

The Plantation Index eased 14.061 points to 8,555.89.

The FBM Emas Index decreased 16.61 points to 13,037.21, FBMT100 Index declined 9.189 points to 12,617.7, FBM 70 dropped 39.57 points to 14,189.76 and the FBM Ace lost 31.6 points to 6,955.35.

Losers outpaced gainers by 561 to 243, while 272 counters were unchanged, 561 untraded and 30 others suspended.

Turnover stood at 1.86 billion shares worth RM1.13 billion.

Among heavyweights, Maybank added two sen to RM10.08 and CIMB gained one sen to RM7.26.

TNB lost eight sen to RM12.40.

Public Bank and Axiata were flat at RM19.34 and RM6.94 respectively.

Of the actives, Sanichi added 3.5 sen to 14 sen, IFCA MSC gained five sen to 44 sen and Takaso earned half a sen to 42 sen.

Sumatec and Globaltec dropped one sen each to 49sen and 10 sen respectively. — Bernama