KUALA LUMPUR, April 7 — Bursa Malaysia ended on a firm note today after two days of losses on bargain hunting in heavyweights, despite the weaker performance on Wall Street overnight.

At 5pm, the FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) rose 21.68 points to end at its intraday high of 1,600.59, just a whisker above the psychological 1,600 level, compared with Tuesday’s close of 1,578.91.

The index opened 5.47 points higher at 1,584.38, and moved between 1,580.90 and 1,600.59 throughout the trading session.

On the broader market, gainers beat losers 590 versus 440, while 465 counters were unchanged, 637 untraded and 10 others suspended.

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Total volume increased to 6.30 billion shares valued at RM3.62 billion from 6.27 billion shares valued at RM3.22 billion on Tuesday.

The regional market performance was mixed with Singapore’s Straits Times Index easing 0.35 per cent to 3,196.38, Japan’s Nikkei 225 was 0.12 per cent better at 29,730.79, Hong Kong’s Hang Seng was down by 0.91 per cent to 28,674.80, and South Korea’s Kospi added 0.33 per cent to 3,137.41.

A dealer said the local bourse opened firmer today and stayed in the positive territory throughout the session on bargain hunting, rebounding from its previous two days of losses, but the regional peers remained mixed amid cautious trading following negative cues from Wall Street.

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“The US equities pulled back from the prior session’s record closing highs as investors are cautious over the upcoming quarterly earnings reports, while awaiting the minutes from the Federal Reserve’s latest monetary policy meeting on Wednesday for market direction,” he said.

He said the investors also remained wary over China’s central bank’s directive to the nation’s major lenders to curtail loan growth for the rest of this year after a surge in the first two months on bubble risks concerns.

Bank Islam Malaysia Bhd economist Adam Mohamed Rahim told Bernama the successful vaccine rollouts in the US and UK combined with sturdy economic data had boosted investors risk appetite and aided sentiment for emerging market assets.

“But gains were capped by heightened geopolitical tensions between China and Taiwan as the latter said it will fight to the end if China attacks,” he said.

Locally, Sime Darby Plantation emerged as one of the biggest gainers, recouping yesterday’s losses, to push up the Bursa Malaysia Plantation Index by 1.99 per cent to be the biggest winner today, while Maybank and glove counters also made hefty gains, he added.

Of the heavyweights, Maybank surged 17 sen to RM8.48, Public Bank added two sen to RM4.22, Tenaga and IHH Healthcare rose 10 sen each to RM10.26 and RM5.40, respectively, while Petronas Chemicals was flat at RM7.95.

Among the active counters, Berjaya Corp improved 4.5 sen to 45 sen, Dagang NeXchange rose 5.5 sen to 86 sen, Macpie shed one sen to 9.5 sen, and MLabs eased half-a-sen to four sen.

On the index board, the FBM Emas Index was up 127.37 points to 11,845.99, the FBMT 100 increased 124.34 points to 11,496.76, the FBM Emas Shariah surged 147.77 points to 13,122.98, the FBM 70 advanced 50.94 points to 15,848.50, and the FBM ACE expanded 6.39 points to 9,637.54.

Sector-wise, the Plantation Index went up 138.28 points to 7,077.91, the Industrial Products and Services Index added 1.74 points to 194.88, and the Financial Services Index soared 138.85 points to 15,379.21.

Main Market volume rose to 4.04 billion shares worth RM3.10 billion from Tuesday’s 3.99 billion shares worth RM2.76 billion.

Warrants turnover improved to 277.05 million units valued at RM44.83 million from 242.94 million units valued at RM36.96 million yesterday.

Volume on the ACE Market decreased to 1.98 billion shares worth RM474.41 million from 2.03 billion shares worth RM433.56 million on Tuesday.

Consumer products and services accounted for 628.21 million shares traded on the Main Market, industrial products and services (1.53 billion), construction (207.06 million), technology (615.34 million), SPAC (nil), financial services (77.70 million), property (399.50 million), plantations (44.17 million), REITs (11.27 million), closed/fund (13,000), energy (262.47 million), healthcare (53.85 million), telecommunications and media (42.61 million), transportation and logistics (121.92 million), and utilities (52.08 million). — Bernama