KUALA LUMPUR, May 23 — Shares on Bursa Malaysia closed lower today in line with regional peers, weighed by the Sino-US trade tensions that have escalated into a technology cold war between the two nations.
At the close, the benchmark FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) eased 1.87 points to 1,601.87.
The market barometer opened 3.8 points lower at 1,599.94 and hovered between 1,589.79 and 1,605.13 throughout the day.
A dealer said news that the US administration is considering sanctions on Chinese video surveillance firm Hikvision after imposing similar action on Huawei Technologies last week, had further dampened risk sentiment.
“While risk sentiment had improved in the region during the first few months of the year after Sino-US tensions seemed to be diminishing, the deadlock in trade talks since the start of May has caused disarray in the markets,” he said.
On the home front, market breadth was negative as losers beat gainers 718 to 188 with 314 counters unchanged, 677 untraded and 23 others suspended.
Turnover increased to 2.37 billion units worth RM2.11 billion from yesterday’s 1.8 billion units worth RM1.46 billion.
Among the heavyweights, Maybank added three sen to RM9.02, Public Bank climbed two sen to RM22.50 and CIMB gained one sen to RM5.15.
Petronas Chemicals fell 19 sen to RM8.63 and TNB lost two sen to RM11.66.
Of the actively-traded stocks, Vortex lost 3.5 sen to 27 sen, Sapura Energy and Lambo slipped one sen each to 30 sen and 5.5 sen respectively, Dayang shed 24 sen to 89 sen and Barakah declined two sen to five sen.
The FBM Emas Index lost 45.58 points to 11,209.73, the FBMT 100 was 34.22 points lower at 11,064.4 and the FBM 70 fell 128.86 points to 13,569.57.
The FBM Emas Shariah Index declined 66.85 points to 11,332.28 and the FBM Ace Index dipped 103.31 points to 4,288.9.
Sector-wise, the Financial Services Index decreased 31.93 points to 16,553.32, the Plantation Index fell 45.15 points to 6,837.42 and the Industrial Products and Services Index was 1.78 points lower at 161.42.
Main Market volume increased to 1.51 billion shares worth RM1.92 billion from Tuesday’s 1.17 billion shares worth RM1.34 billion.
Warrants turnover swelled to 444.03 million units valued at RM120.49 million from 292.27 million units valued at RM73.76 million.
Volume on the ACE Market expanded to 420.55 million shares worth RM70.87 million from 331.36 million shares worth RM40.73 million previously.
Consumer products and services accounted for 272.4 million shares traded on the Main Market, industrial products and services (172.48 million), construction (161.32 million), technology (107.28 million), SPAC (nil), financial services (53.65 million), property (130.97 million), plantation (23.33 million), REITs (10.64 million), closed/fund (5,000), energy (463.19 million), healthcare (37.12 million), telecommunications and media (28.56 million), transportation and logistics (25.02 million) and utilities (25.66 million). — Bernama
