KUALA LUMPUR, June 27 — Bursa Malaysia ended mixed today in lacklustre trading with plantation and healthcare heavyweights dragging the FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) lower by 1.79 points to 1,672.70 at the close.
The index opened 3.76 points lower at 1,670.73 as compared with yesterday’s close of 1,674.49.
Gainers beat losers slightly by 366 to 352, with 445 counters unchanged, 742 untraded and 103 suspended.
Turnover was slightly higher at 1.84 billion units valued at RM1.9 billion compared with 1.83 billion units valued at RM1.55 billion yesterday.
Inter-Pacific Securities head of research Pong Teng Siew said the market was quiet ahead of the mid-year close.
He said the current thin volume suggested institutional and retail investors were mostly sidelined.
Pong said retail investors in the market also seemed to be avoiding volatile shares amid the current lack of market-moving news on the local front.
“There is also no obvious window dressing in the way that has been done previously and we don’t have huge swings in the market. I can say window dressing is quite muted.
“Maybe late tomorrow we could have a better close when fund managers try to engage in last-minute window dressing,” he told Bernama.
Meanwhile, another analyst said the local bourse’s performance was more or less in line with regional peers, as the market reacted positively to news that the United States and China have tentatively agreed to a truce ahead of their meeting at the two-day G20 summit in Japan which starts tomorrow.
The analyst said market players were closely monitoring the trade talks updates, hoping both nations are able to resolve the dispute, which has weighed on global markets.
Among the heavyweights, Petronas Gas dropped 40 sen to RM17.10, Tenaga lost 10 sen to RM13.68, while Maybank and CIMB were three sen lower at RM8.89 and RM5.35 respectively.
PetChem and KLK both fell four sen to RM8.38 and RM24.54, while Genting Malaysia was flat at RM3.20 and PPB declined two sen to RM18.56.
As for the active stocks, Sapura Energy was two sen lower at 29.5 sen, newly listed Mestron added two sen to 15.5 sen and Lambo was unchanged at 6.5 sen.
The FBM Emas Index fell 2.45 points to 11,790.20, the FBMT 100 Index was down 3.86 points at 11,642.87 and the FBM Emas Shariah Index rose 4.62 points to 12,131.24.
The FBM 70 improved 29.95 points to 14,643.25 while the FBM Ace shed 12.88 points to 4,442.44.
Sector-wise, the Financial Services Index lost 23.37 points to 16,709.23, the Industrial Products and Services Index edged down 0.70 of-a-point to 160.70 while the Plantation Index was 6.70 points weaker at 6,966.28.
Main Market volume rose to 1.13 billion shares worth RM1.75 billion from to 1.10 billion shares worth RM1.38 billion yesterday.
Warrants turnover slid to 386.05 million units valued at RM79.96 million from 424.78 million units valued at RM91.33 million.
Volume on the ACE Market increased to 313.96 million shares worth RM65.22 million from 303.02 million shares worth RM70.16 million.
Consumer products and services accounted for 228.01 million shares traded on the Main Market, industrial products and services (121.19 million), construction (89.04 million), technology (98.51 million), SPAC (nil), financial services (52.01 million), property (94.48 million), plantation (14.88 million), REITs (14.58 million), closed/fund (nil), energy (289.33 million), healthcare (28.58 million), telecommunications and media (40.22 million), transportation and logistics (28.53 million) and utilities (25.71 million). — Bernama
