KUALA LUMPUR, March 30 — Bursa Malaysia ended the morning session on a negative note today, tracking its regional peers as the Covid-19 jitters sweep across the globe.
At 12.30pm, the FBM KLCI fell 17.33 points or 1.29 per cent to 1,325.76 from last Friday’s close of 1,343.09.
The key index opened 6.86 points weaker at 1,336.23 today, and hovered between 1,317.39 and 1,336.23 throughout the morning session.
On the broader market, decliners beat advancers 523 to 230, while 237 counters were unchanged, 1,020 untraded and 108 others suspended.
Turnover amounted to 1.67 billion shares worth RM918.95 million.
Regionally, Japan’s Nikkei dipped 3.13 per cent to 18,782.41; Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index lost 1.29 per cent to 23,181.07 and Singapore’s Straits Times Index was 3.90 per cent lower at 2,430.05.
A dealer said the Covid-19 fears pulled the United States’ (US) stock market lower last Friday after three consecutive sessions of uptrend.
The Dow Jones dropped 915.4 points or 4.06 per cent to 21,636.8; S&P 500 Index lost 3.37 per cent while Nasdaq finished 3.79 per cent easier at 7,502.4.
In a note today, Rakuten Trade Sdn Bid said US President Donald Trump finally admitted that the Covid-19 pandemic was more serious than he had initially thought and extended the US closure from April 12 to April 30, saying that the fatalities could even touch 100,000.
“This could have an adverse impact on the financial markets and could see sellers overwhelm activities again.
“We anticipate heightened volatility and envisage the FBM KLCI to be under a bit of selling pressure, re-testing the 1,320 support level,” it said.
Among heavyweights, Maybank trimmed five sen to RM7.32, Public Bank slashed 10 sen to RM15.80, IHH skidded seven sen to RM5.19, Maxis decreased eight sen to RM5.29 while Tenaga was 12 sen better at RM11.82.
The most actively- traded stocks were Vortex, which increased two sen to five sen, while Careplus added 4.5 sen to 27 sen, Ekovest and Reach Energy slipped half-a-sen each to 37.5 sen and 3.5 sen respectively, while MLAB was unchanged at 1.5 sen.
Top losers were led by F&N which erased 94 sen to RM29.14, Dutch Lady sank 92 sen to RM41.96, Ajinomoto was 68 sen lower at RM12.30, Hong Leong Bank fell 62 sen to RM13.58 and Yinson decreased 54 sen to RM4.76.
On the index board, the FBM Emas Index declined 128.79 points to 9,057.51, the FBM Emas Shariah Index shed 137.18 points to 9,871.20 while the FBMT 100 Index gave up 129.14 points to 8,993.09.
The FBM 70 slumped 197.18 points to 10,338.66 but the FBM Ace rebounded 26.65 points to 3,793.60.
Sector-wise, the Industrial Products and Services Index edged down 0.99 of-a-point to 103.2.30, the Financial Services Index dipped 183.82 points to 12,121.12 and the Plantation Index was 103.12 points easier at 6,030.51.— Bernama
