KUALA LUMPUR, April 7 — Persistent buying in selected heavyweights pushed the benchmark FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) higher at close today, in line with regional markets, dealers said.
The key index closed at an intra-day high of 1,856.51, up 13.57 points, after slipping to a low of 1,843.18 in the afternoon session.
MISC and TNB, the largest contributors to the index gain with a combined total of 6.32 points, rose 38 sen and 24 sen to RM8.98 and RM14.56, respectively.
Most Asian markets rose today following the positive lead from Wall Street overnight, while investors remained cautious as to how the US market would react over the weak job data.
A dealer said that the market was however relieved on the expectations of a delay in the interest rate hike by the US Federal Reserve as the economy is seen still fragile.
Gainers outpaced losers by 502 to 354, while 327 counters were unchanged, 613 untraded and 19 others suspended.
Total volume was lower at 1.95 billion units worth RM2.10 billion from yesterday’s 1.99 billion units worth RM1.67 billion.
As for other heavyweights, Maybank and CIMB added 5 sen each to RM9.55 and RM6.30, respectively, Public Bank gained 12 sen to RM19.28, while Axiata was flat at RM7.07.
Takaso Resources, which topped the most active counters, rose 3.5 sen to 55 sen, Sumatec earned half-a-sen to 22 sen, Ingenuity eased half-a-sen to 9 sen and Tiger Synergy declined 1 sen to 12 sen.
On the scoreboard, the FBM Emas Index jumped 80.93 points to 12,705.87, the FBMT100 Index advanced 82.39 points to 12,403.76, while the FBM Ace fell 25.70 points to 7,192.70.
The FBM Emas Syariah Index perked 72.10 points to 13,236.63 and the FBM 70 garnered 57.83 points to 13,536.48.
On a sectoral basis, the Industrial Index improved 32.32 points to 3,403.45, the Finance Index climbed 113.09 points to 16,511.18 while the Plantation Index went up 13.46 points to 7,812.63.
Main Market volume increased to 1.21 billion shares worth RM1.94 billion from yesterday’s 1.04 billion shares worth RM1.50 billion.
Turnover on the ACE Market fell to 657.02 million units valued at RM144.82 million from 899.88 million units valued at RM182.51 million yesterday.
Warrants rose to 73.44 million shares worth RM13.46 million from 50.24 million shares worth RM7.47 million previously.
Consumer products accounted for 129.76 million shares traded on the Main Market, industrial products (186.85 million), construction (54.76 million), trade and services (522.47 million), technology (60.29 million), infrastructure (14.10 million), SPAC (7.16 million), finance (61.49 million), hotels (957,500), properties (146.75 million), plantations (19.46 million), mining (nil), REITs (6.86 million) and closed/fund (2,000). — Bernama
