KUALA LUMPUR, July 23 — The continuous rise in Covid-19 cases globally as well as concerns of another wave of infections have driven glove manufacturing counters on Bursa Malaysia higher, simultaneously pushing the local bourse soaring.
Bursa Malaysia’s key index, the FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI), recorded strong gains as it rose 19.44 points to 1,606.42, breaching its immediate resistance of 1,600 points.
The index moved between 1,585.45 and 1,607.80 throughout the day.
On the overall market, gainers led losers by 599 to 452, while 422 counters were unchanged, 514 untraded and 16 others suspended.
Trading volume meanwhile remained overwhelming with 12.12 billion units worth RM6.65 billion transacted, marking the second highest for the week after a record high was set on Monday with 12.49 billion shares valued at RM6.64 billion.
An analyst said that the high volume transacted was driven mainly by rubber glove counters as well as active counters listed on the ACE market.
“For two days in a row, a market debutant recorded an impressive performance with today’s newbie, construction player TCS jumping 22 sen to 45 sen at close,” she said.
Besides that, heavy trading in other active stocks such as BioAlpha, XOX and PDZ as well as glove market leaders TopGlove and Careplus pushed up the market volume.
“This indicates that the local market is attractive for institutional, retail as well as foreign investors as the prospects of the economy remain steady,” she said.
On the technical front, she said as the main index had breached the 1,600-point level supported by heavy buying in TopGlove and Hartalega, this upbeat performance was expected to continue.
“The immediate support level has been raised to 1,590 and the immediate resistance now stands at 1,615.0,” she added.
Top Glove and Hartalega were the top gainers and top performers in the FBM KLCI, gaining RM1.42 and 62 sen to RM26.12 and RM18 respectively, collectively pushing the composite index up by 11.97 points.
Petronas Chemicals gained 20 sen to RM6.41 and CIMB group added 11 sen to RM3.66.
On the index board, the FBM Emas Index climbed 122.29 points to 11,382.58, the FBMT 100 index rose 125.35 points to 11,226.03 and the FBM Emas Shariah Index was 168.66 points stronger at 13,230.20.
The FBM 70 soared 117.79 points to 14,274.87 and the FBM ACE was 234.81 points better at 7,908.85.
Sector-wise, the Financial Services Index added 79.93 points to 13,514.64, the Plantation Index put on 87.45 points to 7,119.84 and the Industrial Products and Services Index added 1.75 points to 141.62. — Bernama
