KUALA LUMPUR, Feb 5 — Bursa Malaysia turned lower at midday, bucking the uptrend among regional peers amidst the quiet market tone ahead of the weekend.
At 12.30pm, the benchmark FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) slipped 3.67 points or 0.23 per cent to 1,581.23, after moving between 1,579.76 and 1,590.47 throughout the morning trading session.
The index opened 2.8 points better at 1,587.70, compared with Thursday’s close of 1,584.90.
On the broader market, losers surpassed gainers 512 to 469, while 439 counters were unchanged, 710 untraded and 11 others suspended.
Volume stood at 3.38 billion units worth RM1.98 billion.
An analyst said the market saw some profit-taking activities ahead of the weekend and the Chinese New Year celebration next week.
“We already predicted profit-taking today following the gains recorded at yesterday’s close, but in the near term, we expect the exchange to continue to be vibrant, given the resumption of economic activities such as construction, building materials, property and gaming,” she said.
After opening higher practically across the board today, the uptrend momentum on the local bourse had slowly receded, but some support emerged for sectors such as energy, industrial products and services, transportation and logistics, construction, as well as technology.
Additionally, trading among smaller cap companies is also gathering momentum and brokerage firms project that this may be a prelude for more activities for these companies.
Of the 30-heavyweights, 11 companies were higher, one was flat and 18 others were lower.
Maybank lost one sen to RM7.88, Top Glove declined 12 sen to RM6.59, Public Bank rose two sen to RM4.10, while Petronas Chemicals was 20 sen stronger at RM7.41.
Of the actives, I-Stone added one sen to 24.5 sen, Trive Property gained two sen to 26 sen and Luster shed one sen to 21.5 sen.
Top gainers are tech-linked company Genetec Technology which jumped 69 sen to RM4.42, telco-linked company Amtel Holdings which improved 31 sen to RM4.22, and industrial products and services-linked firm Kumpulan H&L High-Tech which gained 31 sen to RM2.26.
Top losers are Nestle which erased 80 sen to RM137.20, Computer Forms which declined 58 sen to RM2.38 and KLK which depreciated 46 sen to RM23.34.
On the index board, the FBM Emas Index fell 18.31 points to 11,511.95 and the FBMT 100 Index slipped 21.47 points to 11,241.36.
The FBM Emas Shariah Index lost 23.73 points to 13,071.18, FBM 70 slipped 11.13 points to 15,049.82 while the FBM ACE rose 45.47 points to 10,962.31.
Sector-wise, the Financial Services Index gave up 14.75 points to 14,585.15, the Plantation Index contracted 63.99 points to 7,143.78, while the Industrial Products and Services Index inched up 1.87 points to 176.58.
— Bernama
