KUALA LUMPUR, Feb 5 — The FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) continued yesterday’s gains to close marginally higher today, lifted by last minute buying.

At 5 pm, the key index finished at 1,803.21 points, up 0.19 of a point, after fluctuating between 1,796.41 points and 1,804.25 points throughout the day.

Gains were mostly contributed by banking stocks, led by Maybank, which helped pushed it up by 1.468 points.

Maybank rose nine sen to RM8.92, while other banking stocks, namely, CIMB advanced nine sen to RM5.74 and Public Bank gained eight sen to RM18.44.

JF Apex Securities Head of Research Lee Chung Cheng said despite opening slightly higher this morning, the FBM KLCI was in a volatile mood, weighed on by profit taking and mixed overseas sentiment.

“Mild profit taking emerged following yesterday’s bullish gains, while external factors, including developments in Greece’s debt negotiations and the People’s Bank of China loosening monetary policy, fanned a mixed outlook for investors,” he told Bernama.

He added some investors were still in a “holiday mood” and reluctant to take a major position due to the shortened trading week, as well as, ahead of the Chinese New Year celebration.

On the scoreboard, the FBM Emas Index increased 1.47 points to 12,395.87 points, the FBMT100 Index improved 1.5 points to 12,100.33, the FBM 70 gained 2.68 points to 13,408.79 points and the FBM Ace added 1.15 points to 6,514.6 points.

However, the FBM Emas Syariah Index fell 27.5 points to 12,937.41.

On a sectoral basis, the Finance Index chalked up 83.93 points to 15,758.1 points, with the Plantation Index gaining 6.07 points to 7,980.26 points.

But the Industrial Index slipped 5.54 points to 3,278.03 points. 

Total turnover declined to 1.65 billion shares valued at RM2.09 billion from 2.41 billion shares valued at RM2.69 billion transacted yesterday.

Losers outpaced gainers 433 to 344, while 326 counters were unchanged, 627 untraded and 15 others suspended. 

Among actives, Globaltec inched up half a sen to 7.5 sen, but Asia Bioenergy slipped two sen to 16.5 sen.

Of the heavyweights, TNB fell 10 sen to RM14.54 and Sime Darby shed one sen to RM9.54, while Axiata was flat at RM7.17.

Main Market volume narrowed to 1.08 billion units valued at RM1.93 billion from the 1.54 billion units valued at RM2.49 billion yesterday.

Turnover on the ACE Market shrank to 466.37 million shares worth RM121.94 million from yesterday’s 770.99 million shares worth RM174.43 million.

Warrants improved to 101.13 million units worth RM40.03 million from 99.22 million units worth RM20.47 previously.

Consumer products accounted for 97.71 million shares traded on the Main Market, industrial products (225.31 million), construction (77.31 million), trade and services (346.41 million), technology (101.27 million), infrastructure (17.51 million), SPAC (7.87 million), finance (74.47 million), hotels (2.71 million), properties (101.32 million), plantations (18.36 million), mining (1,700), REITs (8.71 million) and closed/fund (3,000). — Bernama