Bursa Malaysia ends week in the red on persistent selling

KUALA LUMPUR: Bursa Malaysia ended in negative territory yesterday in line with its Asian peers on continued selling in selected heavyweights in the telecommunications, utilities, consumer products and services, and finance sectors.

The benchmark FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI ( FBM KLCI) declined 12.96 points to close at 1,777.15 versus Thursday’s close of 1,790.11.

Axiata, Petronas Gas, Petronas Dagangan and RHB Bank contributed a combined 5.115 points to the losses in the composite index.

After opening 2.59 points weaker at 1,787.52, the index moved between 1,776.52 and 1,787.52 throughout the day.

On the scoreboard, market breadth was weaker with losers overwhelming gainers 639 to 265, while 349 counters unchanged, 621 untraded and 17 others suspended.

Volume stood at 2.06 billion units valued at RM1.89 billion compared with 2.06 billion units worth RM2.45 billion.

Bank Islam Malaysia Bhd chief economist Dr Mohd Afzanizam Abdul Rashid said Asian markets including Bursa Malaysia were in the red territory, dampened by the latest US Automatic Data Processing Inc employment reports that trounced economists’ forecast.

The data reported that the private- sector employment soared in September, as employers added 230,000 jobs, and this was beyond market expectation of 179,000.

“This signalled that the nonfarm payroll could also do well during September. Strong employment markets alongside rising wages have bolstered the case for the Federal Reserve to hike its funds rate in December as inflation rate will continue to hover above the two per cent target,” he told Bernama.

In addition, Mohd Afzanizam said the latest news on the technology hacks suggested the trade friction between the US and China was likely to be prolonged, which might spark negative market sentiment regionally, at least for the next two months.

According to a report, almost 30 major US companies including Amazon and Apple were hacked by Chinese spies.

Among heavyweights, Maybank fell four sen to RM9.66, Public Bank and CIMB were two sen lower at RM24.98 and RM6.04, respectively, while Tenaga declined six sen to RM15.44.

For actives, Sapura Energy eased two sen to 39 sen, Sanbumi inched down half- a- sen to 30 sen, Yong Tai rose six sen to 69 sen while Borneo Oil was flat at 5.5 sen.

The FBM Emas Index reduced 90.17 points to 12,407.17, the FBM Emas Shariah Index slid 122.77 points to 12,511.82 and the FBMT 100 Index decreased 89.40 points to 12,214.63.

The FBM Ace Index dropped 65.50 points to 5,230.06, while the FBM 70 lost 108.52 points to 14,679.12.

Sector- wise, the Plantation Index dipped 19.79 points to 7,482.43, the Financial Services Index inched down 49.47 points to 17,712.12, while the Industrial Products and Services Index edged down 0.37 of-a-point to 177.00.

Main Market volume rose to 1.39 billion shares worth RM1.74 billion from 1.34 billion shares worth RM2.28 billion on Thursday.

Warrants’ turnover increased to 428.84 million units valued at RM94.50 million versus 398.91 million units worth RM100.42 million previously.

Volume on the ACE Market shrank to 239.36 million units worth RM50.56 million from 318.59 million units valued at RM75.1 million previously.

Consumer products and services accounted for 184.43 million shares traded on the Main Market, industrial products and services ( 248.97 million), construction ( 100.60 million), technology ( 184.04 million), SPAC ( 100,000), financial services (50.39 million), property ( 205.09 million), plantations ( 18.49 million), REITs (8.30 million), closed/fund (59,000), energy (286.56 million), healthcare ( 33.49 million), telecommunication and media (19.53 million), transportation and logistics (28.96 million), and utilities (19.19 million).

For further information on stocks and prices, please visit www.bursamalaysia.com.