Bursa Malaysia closes lower

Bursa Malaysia closed on easier note yesterday dampened by lingering geopolitical concerns.

At 5 pm, the FTSE Bursa Mal ays i a KLCI ( FBM KLCI) finished 5.9 points lower at 1,738.18 compared to Wednesday’s close of 1,744.08.

The key index opened 0.74 of- a- point lower at 1,743.34 and moved between 1 ,7 3 5 . 6 9 and 1 ,74 3 . 3 4 throughout the day.

Market breadth was negative with 765 losers and 220 gainers, while 305 counters were unchanged, 452 untraded and 16 others suspended.

Volume decreased to 3.86 billion units worth RM2.59 billion from Wednesday’s 4.08 billion units worth RM2.4 billion.

A dealer said sentiments cont inued to be subdued due to the ongoing global geopolitical tensions and heightened political risk in Europe which limited the appetite for riskier assets.

“Cautious external tone should continue to dampen nearterm sentiment, forcing stocks to consolidate with downward bias,” he said.

On the local front, the FBM Emas Index fell 57.521 points to 12,383.22, FBMT100 Index eased 50.35 points to 12,018.21 and the FBM 70 declined 97.37 points to 14,657.3.

The FBM Ace dipped 98.39 points to 6,106.7 and the FBM Emas Shariah Index decreased 66.08 points to 12,852.55.

Sector- wise, the Finance Index gave up 80.08 points to 15,617.06, Industrial Index went down 17.26 points to 3,252.66 and the Plantation Index shed 127.44 points to 7,948.16.

Of the other heavyweights, Maybank, Public Bank and Sime Darby lost two sen each to RM8.96, RM19.94 and RM9.28, respectively.

Petronas Chemicals fell five sen to RM7.75.

TNB added two sen to RM13.74.

Among actives, Malayan United and Tiger Synergy eased hal f a sen each to 24.5 sen and 5.5 sen respectively.

Borneo Oil was flat at 18.5 sen.

Priceworth International added one sen to 24.5 sen and SKH gained 1.5 sen to 16.5 sen.

The Main Market turnover increased to 2.58 billion units worth RM2.42 billion from Wednesday’ s 2.44 billion units worth RM2.19 billion.

Volume on the ACE Market fell to 1.1 billion shares valued at RM141.43 mi l lion from yesterday’s 1.4 billion shares valued at RM185.97 million.

Warrants surged to 167.72 million units worth RM 24.09 million from 156.24 million units worth RM 22.58 million previously.

Consumer products accounted for 186.2 million shares traded on the Main Market, industrial products ( 676.13 mi l lion), construction (129.73 million), trade and services (995.32 million ), technology (161.34 million), infrastructure (13.36 mi l lion), SPAC ( 471,000) , finance (113.08 million ), hotels (7.44 million ), properties ( 266 mi l lion) , plantations ( 27.19 million), mining ( 3,500), REITs ( 6.41 mil lion) and closed/ fund (44,000). For further information on stocks and prices, please visit www.bursamalaysia.com.