KUALA LUMPUR, April 16 — Bursa Malaysia is expected to witness cautious trading next week amid a lack of major catalysts to influence investors’ risk appetite.

Rakuten Trade Sdn Bhd equity research vice-president Thong Pak Leng reckoned that the local market will see some headwinds next week amid the heightening regional volatility.

"Nonetheless, we believe accumulation of stocks will persist on dips,” he told Bernama.

Meanwhile, Bank Islam Malaysia Bhd chief economist Mohd Afzanizam Abdul Rashid opined that the index is having difficulties trying to break the 1,600-point psychological level.

"I think the similar dynamics would continue next week as investors would continue to be more anxious as the Fed’s May 3 and 4 Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) meeting draws nearer.

"In short, there’s not much positive vibes at the moment. Perhaps, fund managers would prefer to hold more cash at this juncture given the lingering uncertainties,” he added.

For the week just ended, Mohd Afzanizam said foreign fund flows had recorded some net sales in the local bourse on April 13 and 14, whereby net sales of RM22.29 million and RM41.83 million were reported.

On a Friday-to-Friday basis, the FBM KLCI slipped 18.28 points to end the week at 1,589.01 from 1,607.29 in the previous week.

On the index board, the FBMT100 Index decreased 139.28 points to 11,061.34, the FBM Emas Shariah Index dropped 155.02 points to 12,047.57, and the FBM Emas Index slid 137.89 points to 11,413.70.

Meanwhile, the FBM ACE contracted 74.98 points to 5,786.50 and the FBM 70 lost 222.50 points to 13,781.35.

Sector-wise, the Plantation Index erased 1.67 points to 8,355.27, the Industrial Products and Services Index was unchanged at 214.47, and the Energy Index dipped 6.27 points to 751.27.

The Financial Services Index dropped 146.33 points to 16,636.0, the Healthcare Index shed 77.76 points to 2,087.45, and the Technology Index trimmed 4.19 points to 72.44.

Weekly turnover grew to 17.33 billion units valued at RM10.46 billion from 16.94 billion units valued at RM11.29 billion last week.

The Main Market volume decreased to 11.55 billion shares worth RM9.33 billion versus 11.73 billion shares worth RM10 billion in the previous week.

Warrants volume fell marginally to 1.46 billion units valued at RM236.16 million against 1.61 billion units valued at RM257.69 million previously.

The ACE Market volume advanced to 4.30 billion shares worth RM889.94 million from 3.58 billion shares worth RM1.03 billion the week before. — Bernama