KUALA LUMPUR, May 23 — Bursa Malaysia ended higher today in line with regional stock markets following a stronger Wall Street performance on Friday, dealers said.

The benchmark FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) moved sideways throughout the day, sliding to as low as 1,621.43 before settling at today’s intraday high of 1,634.89, up 6.1 points from Friday’s close.

A dealer said Asian shares rose after a solid session on Wall Street as investors anticipated the US Federal Reserve was on track to raise interest rates sooner rather than later.

“Markets have started to entertain the prospect of a near-term US rate hike after last week’s release of the US Federal Reserve’s meeting minutes showed that policymakers weren’t shying away from raising interest rates as early as next month,” he added.

On the scoreboard, The FBM Emas Index rose 41.36 points to 11,451.08, the FBMT100 Index chalked up 44.181 points to 11,143.57 and the FBM Emas Shariah Index was 41.82 points higher at 11,971.84.

The FBM 70 rose 60.68 points to 12,987.72 while the FBM Ace lost 67.23 points to 5,620.96.

The Finance Index climbed 43.10 points to 14,291.42, the Plantation Index decreased 56.08 points to 7,518.73 and the Industrial Index was 4.89 points better at 3,073.26.

Losers edged gainers 451 to 337 with 378 counters unchanged, 560 untraded and 15 others were suspended.

Volume stood at 1.73 billion shares worth RM1.38 billion from last Friday’s 1.73 billion shares worth RM1.64 billion.

Of heavyweights, Maybank and Petronas Chemicals added three sen each to RM8.47 and RM6.43 respectively, TNB gained four sen to RM14.02, Public Bank chalked up 12 sen to RM19.28 and IHH advanced 13 sen to RM6.62.

Among actives, AirAsia X eased 1.5 sen to 39 sen, Vivocom lost one sen to 31 sen, while Eka Noodles and Inix were down half-a-sen each to 12 sen and 5.5 sen respectively.

XOX gained 1.5 sen to 16.5 sen.

Main Market turnover was slightly higher at 1.07 billion units valued at RM1.28 billion from Friday’s 1.06 billion units valued at RM1.52 billion.

The ACE Market turnover rose to 560.72 million units valued at RM82.51 million versus 549.22 million units valued at RM99.03 million.

Warrants declined to 105.43 million units valued at RM16.8 million from 117.92 million units valued at RM20.56 million previously.

Consumer products accounted for 134.58 million shares traded on the Main Market, industrial products (231.97 million), construction (46.42 million), trade and services (482.08 million), technology (53.57 million), infrastructure (11.71 million), SPAC (13.02 million), finance (27.64 million), hotels (305,700), properties (51.55 million), plantations (14.86 million), mining (nil), REITs (3.99 million) and closed/fund (39,100). — Bernama