KUALA LUMPUR, April 17 — The benchmark FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) ended marginally lower today, reversing earlier gains on mild profit taking prior to the weekend.

At 5pm, the FBM KLCI settled at 1,845.86, down 2.08 points after fluctuating between 1,852.95 and 1,845.09.

Public Bank was the main contributor to the composite index today, gaining 22 sen to RM19.46 with 6.95 million shares changing hands, while Genting Group dragged the index lower.

Genting Bhd slipped 20 sen to RM8.77 and Genting Malaysia erased 12 sen to RM4.47, while other laggards included IOI Corporation, which eased 11 sen to RM4.50, and Tenaga, which retraced 10 sen to RM14.40.

On the broader market, gainers overwhelmed losers by 493 to 334, with 357 counters unchanged, 624 counters untraded and 20 others suspended.

A senior dealer said traders locked recent gains while some were sidelined prior to the weekend. He said investors’ confidence in Malaysia’s debt market will lend spill-over effects to Bursa next week.

“The oversubsription to the Malaysian government’s inaugural long tenured sukuk yesterday marked the global investors’ confidence in the Malaysian financial system and there will be spill-over effects to Bursa,” he said, adding the foreign funds emerged as Bursa’s net buyers yesterday.

Total volume at Bursa today stood at 2.58 billion shares worth RM2.28 billion, down from yesterday’s 2.70 billion shares worth RM2.52 billion.

The FBM Emas Index was 3.91 points lower at 12,724.26, the FBMT100 Index declined 8.53 points to 12,388.40 and the FBM Emas Shariah Index shed 5.77 points to 13,264.36.

The FBM 70 meanwhile edged up 11.61 points to 13,736.17, and the FBM Ace improved 26.82 points to 7,301.08.

On a sectoral basis, the Finance Index added 15.80 points to 16,347.90, the Plantation Index trimmed 37.09 points to 7,736.47 while the Industrial Index eased 6.61 points to 3,405.98.

Among actives, Bioalpha advanced 9.5 sen to 38.5 sen, Frontken added one sen to 25.5 sen, while Xinghe, Talam and R&A Telecommunication were flat at 7.5 sen, 8 sen and 4 sen respectively, and Pesona Metro added 7.5 sen to 88.5 sen.

Pharmaniaga led the list of top gainers, adding 44 sen to RM6.80 while top loser Nestle fell 98 sen to RM74.50.

Main Market volume shrank to 1.63 billion units worth RM2.02 billion from yesterday’s 1.67 billion units worth RM2.29.

Turnover on the ACE Market dwindled to 898.78 million shares valued at RM253.46 million compared with 930.78 million shares valued at RM216.54 million yesterday.

Warrants decreased to 46.91 million units worth RM8.30 million from 87.12 million units worth RM12.15 million previously.

Consumer products accounted for 176.06 million shares traded on the Main Market, industrial products (234.14 million), construction (208.31 million), trade and services (611.44 million), technology (78.81 million), infrastructure (14.87 million), SPAC (7.79 million), finance (63.76 million), hotels (3.25 million), properties (212.69 million), plantations (12.75 million), mining (30,700), REITs (6.63 million) and closed/fund (49,000). — Bernama