KUALA LUMPUR, July 8 — Bursa Malaysia ended sharply lower today amid cautious sentiment over the high daily Covid-19 infection level that has breached 8,000 new cases today, and was also in line with the regional markets.

At 5pm, the benchmark FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) trimmed 21.44 points or 1.4 per cent to 1,508.71 from yesterday’s close of 1,530.15.  

The market bellwether opened 4.25 points lower at 1,525.9 — the day’s high—and fell as low as 1,501.21 during the day’s trading.

On the broader market, losers thumped gainers 1,057 to 147, while 285 counters were unchanged, 699 untraded and 10 others suspended.

Turnover increased to 5.35 billion units worth RM3.54 billion from yesterday’s 4.8 billion units worth RM2.73 billion. 

Malaysia recorded 8,868 more Covid-19 cases today, the country’s second highest daily figure, behind the 9,020 cases reported on May 29.

The country’s cumulative cases have now passed the 800,000 mark with a total of 808,658 infections.

Meanwhile, Bank Negara Malaysia has today maintained the Overnight Policy Rate (OPR) at 1.75 per cent at its fourth Monetary Policy Committee meeting following the global economic recovery, supported by improvements in manufacturing and services activity.

Of the regional peers, Singapore’s Straits Times Index discounted 0.97 per cent to 3,111.26, Japan’s Nikkei 225 narrowed 0.88 per cent to 28,118.03 and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index lost 2.88 per cent to 27,153.13.

Bursa Malaysia’s heavyweights, Digi was flat at RM4.13, Maybank and Public Bank slipped three sen each to RM8.03 and RM4.05, while IHH Healthcare declined two sen to RM5.60 and CIMB lost 17 sen to RM4.43. 

Of the actives, Advance Synergy increased one sen to 17 sen, Metronic edged up half-a-sen to 4.5 sen, Pelangi Publishing rose 1.5 sen to 38 sen, Serba Dinamik fell four sen to 44 sen, Pelikan shed seven sen to 38.5 sen and Dagang Nexchange went down 4.5 sen to 66.5 sen.

On the index board, the FBM Emas Index dropped 177.37 points to 10,988, the FBMT 100 Index declined 163.19 points to 10,704.31, and the FBM Emas Shariah Index decreased 200.23 points to 12,013.49.  

The FBM ACE lost 377.22 points to 7,063.52, and the FBM 70 dropped 260.69 points to 14,247.4.

Sector-wise, the Financial Services Index shed 173.35 points to 14,876.86, the Industrial Products and Services Index edged down 3.96 points to 186.26, and the Plantation Index trimmed 96.10 points to 6,276.84. 

Main Market volume rose to 3.69 billion shares valued at RM3.03 billion from Wednesday’s 3.46 billion shares valued to RM2.28 billion.   

Warrants turnover advanced to 318.97 million units worth RM39.22 million from 190.05 million units worth RM21.90 million yesterday.

Volume on the ACE Market went up to 1.34 billion shares worth RM474.77 million from 1.14 billion shares worth RM425.29 million.

Consumer products and services accounted for 644.64 million shares traded on the Main Market, industrial products and services (960.03 million), construction (193.30 million), technology (434.93 million), SPAC (nil), financial services (93.87 million), property (192.47 million), plantation (40.33 million), REITs (5.78 million), closed/fund (13,900), energy (735.10 million), healthcare (100.38 million), telecommunications and media (178.56 million), transportation and logistics (80.53 million), and utilities (27.94 million). — Bernama