.JPG "An investor monitors the stock prices in the gallery of the RHB Investment Bank Bhd headquarters in Kuala Lumpur March 17, 2020. u00e2u20acu2022 Picture by Hari Anggara")
KUALA LUMPUR, April 29 — Bursa Malaysia recorded strong gains during the morning trading session, driven by the resumption of activities in several economic sectors after more than 40 days of the Movement Control Order (MCO).
At lunch break, key index FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) added 11.20 points to 1,383.40 from yesterday’s close of 1,372.20.
On the overall market performance, gainers surpassed losers 530 to 203, while 332 counters were unchanged, 838 untraded and 71 others suspended.
Turnover shot up to 2.70 billion shares worth RM1.20 billion from 234.03 million shares worth RM64.86 million at the opening.
Consumer as well as industrial products and services counters led the gains with 85 and 96 winning counters respectively, with a total turnover volume of 500 million shares worth RM308 million.
The construction index’s performance also improved, rising by 1.73 per cent to 160.09 points.
An analyst attributed the encouraging performance to the government’s soft landing approach before lifting the MCO completely.
“Since the MCO started, the country had lost nearly RM100 billion due to business suspensions. Coupled with the troubling oil price, government’s revenue has dropped drastically.
“However, following the declining number of new cases, economic activities that were halted are now being resumed slowly which will create job opportunities again,” the analyst said.
The Ministry of International Trade and Industry yesterday announced that some sectors have been allowed to resume operations at 100 per cent capacity, including construction and construction-related services, starting today.
“This has restored almost two million jobs that was previously hanging by a thread due to the MCO, which was implemented to curb the spread of Covid-19,” she said.
Among the heavyweights, Petronas Chemicals led the list of gainers after rising by 22 sen to RM5.31, contributing 3.20 points to the composite index; while Maybank upticked seven sen to RM7.43, Tenaga Nasional added eight sen to RM12.18, Public Bank inched up four sen to RM15.98 and IHH rose eight sen to RM5.20.
Of the actives, Key Alliance added 1.5 sen to 9.5 sen, while AT Systematization and Sapura Energy both inched up half-a-sen to four sen and 8.5 sen, respectively.
Top gainers include KLK which rose 40 sen to RM20.70, while sin counters Heineken and Carlsberg both rose by 34 and 30 sen each to RM23.90 and RM20.08, respectively.
Meanwhile, of the top losers, MISC remained in the red due to its arbitration conflict, shedding 44 sen to RM7.94, while United Plantation declined 20 sen to RM24.50 due to lower consumption outlook for the palm oil sector.
On the index board, the FBM Emas Index was 95.25 points stronger at 9,653.27, the FBMT 100 Index increased 87.77 points to 9,524.07, the FBM Emas Shariah Index advanced 117.93 points to 10,729.72, the FBM ACE appreciated 92.15 points to 4,725.17 while the FBM 70 earned 150.11 points to 11,535.44.
Sector-wise, the Financial Services Index expanded 62.13 points to 12,260.93, the Industrial Products and Services Index inched up 2.29 points to 116.61, while Plantation Index rose 82.48 points to 6,236.68. — Reuters
