KUALA LUMPUR, Aug 12 ― Bursa Malaysia trend lower at mid-morning as profit-taking activities in heavyweight stocks led by glove makers weighed down the barometer index.
The movement of the Malaysian equity market was in line with regional peers which took a cue from the overnight fall of US stocks.
At 11.01am, the benchmark FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) fell 9.27 points to 1,555.47 from yesterday's close of 1,564.74.
The key index opened 5.92 points lower at 1,558.82.
Market breadth was negative, as losers thumped gainers 1,055 to 122, while 176 counters were unchanged, 633 untraded and 22 others suspended.
Trading volume stood at 10.58 billion shares worth RM3.88 billion.
Rakuten Trade Sdn Bhd in a note said Wall Street tumbled late in the session as tech-stocks succumbed to profit-taking activities.
It said the Dow Jones index (DJI) Average which was above 28,000 level at one point eventually lost 104 points to close around 27,690.
“With this, we reckoned regional markets to be rather mixed today as the China-US tension remains,” it said.
On the local front, Rakuten said the FBM KLCI continued its slide and believed this to continue amid the price volatility among glove stocks.
“We expected the FBM KLCI to possibly trend within the 1,555 and 1,570 range today,” it added.
Of the heavyweights, Maybank gained six sen to RM7.55, Public Bank rose 38 sen to RM17.30 and Tenaga advanced 12 sen at RM11.12.
Top Glove dropped RM1.60 to RM25.70 and Hartalega slipped RM1.40 to RM16.90.
Of the most active, Sapura Energy and Borneo Oil eased 1.5 each to 13 sen and six sen respectively, Lambo and Pegasus eased one sen each to 5.5 sen and three sen respectively while AT Systematization shed two sen to 11 sen.
On the index board, the FBM Emas Index decreased 150.14 points to 11,116.42, the FBM Emas Shariah Index was 285.75 points lower at 13,028.71 and the FBMT 100 Index declined 128.49 points to 10,948.78.
The FBM 70 dropped 415.86 points to 14,234.34 while the FBM ACE tumbled 840.81 points to 9,799.37.
Sector-wise, the Plantation Index shed 1.49 points to 6,978.05, the Industrial Products and Services Index reduced 3.21 points to 136.10 but the Financial Services Index was up 69.13 points at 13,011.64. ― Bernama
