KUALA LUMPUR, Aug 18 — Bursa Malaysia was mixed in the early session today as selling pressure in heavyweights outweighed buying support in small cap stocks.
At 9.12am, the benchmark FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) was 2.27 points lower at 1,692.05, against yesterday’s close of 1,694.32 points. It opened 1.33 points easier at 1,692.99 at 9am.
However, gainers outpaced losers 148 to 102, while 207 counters were unchanged, 1,232 untraded and 19 others suspended.
Turnover stood at 235.13 million shares worth RM78.54 million.
A dealer said there was some bargain hunting activity by retail investors following yesterday’s losses.
“The overall market tone, however, is cautious due to uncertainty over US monetary policy,” he added.
Among heavyweights, TNB was flat at RM14.80, Maybank eased a sen to RM8, Public Bank lost four sen to RM19.80 and IHH declined two sen to RM6.67.
Of actives, Borneo Oil and AirAsia X added a sen each to 20 sen and 47 sen, respectively, while Hubline added half-a-sen to a sen and Malakoff rose six sen to RM1.76.
The FBM Emas Index gave up 4.67 points for 11,889.86, the FBMT 100 Index lost 7.88 points for 11,581.93, and the FBM Emas Shariah Index declined 0.25 of-a-point to 12,548.68.
The FBM 70 increased 18.63 points to 13,677.66 and the FBM Ace was 16.4 points higher at 5,616.61.
Sector-wise, the Finance Index declined 33.39 to 14,508.46, the Plantation Index gained 3.14 points to 7,741.01 and the Industrial Index eased 2.3 points to 3,192.54. — Bernama
