KUALA LUMPUR, April 23 — Bursa Malaysia remained higher at mid-afternoon today, taking cue on the positive sentiment on the regional market and a bullish outlook on the global economy, dealers said.
At 3pm, key index FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) rose 6.98 points to 1,388.87 from 1,381.89 at yesterday's close.
The overall local market breadth remained bullish with advancers leading decliners 495 to 289, while 353 counters were unchanged, 774 untraded and 32 others suspended.
Turnover stood at 3.57 billion shares worth RM1.65 billion.
A dealer said the most of the Asian stocks were on the uptrend today as investors were positive over further corporate earnings and the latest weekly look at American unemployment, while oil prices continued to mend with crude prices rising above US$15 a barrel in New York.
On the local bourse, heavyweights Maybank slipped one sen to RM7.49, Petronas Chemicals was flat at RM5.39 while TNB improved four sen to RM12.54, Public Bank jumped 12 sen to RM15.84 and IHH Healthcare perked 11 sen to RM5.23.
Among the actives, Vortex Consolidated, Lambo, Nexgram Holdings and Sanichi were all flat at eight sen, 1.5 sen, 1.5 sen and 4.5 sen, respectively.
On the index board, the FBM Emas Index was 60.22 points higher at 9,669.47, the FBM ACE advanced 46.60 points to 4,399.42, the FBM Emas Shariah Index surged 97.79 points to 10,736.48, the FBMT 100 Index garnered 57.91 points to 9,548.04 and the FBM 70 soared 110.85 points to 11,508.10.
Sector-wise, the Industrial Products and Services Index earned 0.16 of-a-point to 117.17, the Financial Services Index went up 15.07 points to 12,379.17 and the Plantation Index increased 1.36 points to 6,138.94. — Bernama
