KUALA LUMPUR, Sept 1 ― Bursa Malaysia ended the morning trading session in the red, tracking the lacklustre performance of global equities amid lingering worries over the United States (US) Federal Reserve’s (Fed) interest rate hikes, dealers said.

At 12.30pm, the benchmark FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) fell 12.65 points to 1,499.40 from Tuesday’s close of 1,512.05.

Bursa Malaysia and its subsidiaries were closed yesterday for the National Day holiday.

The benchmark index opened 14.04 points lower at 1,498.01, subsequently moving between 1,490.71 and 1,503.49 throughout the session.

On the broader market, losers trumped gainers 580 to 216, while 354 counters were unchanged, 1,138 untraded and 20 others suspended.

Turnover stood at 1.41 billion units worth RM986.45 million ActivTrades trader Anderson Alves said Asian equities were on the back foot on Thursday following a negative month-end session on Wall Street, with most sectors closing in the red.

“Traders will be on the lookout for the regional purchasing managers indexes (PMIs) and the Chinese Caixin Manufacturing PMI after the better-than-expected official PMI data yesterday.

“They are also eyeing the Chinese yuan as it traded firmer versus the US dollar. A stronger-than-expected People's Bank of China fixing also helped offset geopolitical worries,” he noted.

He added that major macro events for global markets will be the US nonfarm payrolls data to be released tomorrow, with investors waiting to gauge how aggressive the Fed's monetary policy could be towards year-end.

Regionally, Japan's Nikkei 225 fell 1.71 per cent to 27,612.14, Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index slipped 1.52 per cent to 19,650.77, Singapore’s Straits Times Index eased 0.01 per cent to 3,221.34 and South Korea’s Kospi dropped 1.92 per cent to 2,425.52.

Back home, market heavyweights Maybank eased three sen to RM8.94, Public Bank fell five sen to RM4.66 and Petronas Chemicals shed four sen to RM8.76, while CIMB rose 14 sen to RM5.51 and IHH Healthcare gained three sen to RM6.23.

Of the actives, Jade Marvel Group slipped 18 sen to 32.5 sen, Dagang Nexchange reduced 2.5 sen to 83.5 sen, while Serba Dinamik, MNC Wireless and Vortex were flat at three sen, one sen and 18 sen, respectively.

On the index board, the FBM Emas Index decreased 88.02 points to 10,609.63, the FBMT 100 Index declined 85.86 points to 10,363.57, the FBM 70 slipped 98.07 points to 12,614.37, the FBM ACE went down 92.88 points to 4,817.56 and the FBM Emas Shariah Index tumbled 137.78 points to 10,675.68.

Sector-wise, the Plantation Index was 130.17 points lower at 7,063.50, the Industrial Products and Services Index trimmed 1.33 points to 180.87, the Financial Services Index gave up 8.28 points to 16,793.64 and the Energy Index shed 13.26 points to 715.28. ― Bernama