Foreign funds sell RM478mil equity
After three straight weeks of inflows, they take breather and clear positions
KUALA LUMPUR: After three consecutive weeks of foreign inflows, global investors took a breather as they cleared their positions.
According to MIDF Research, foreign investors offloaded RM477.7mil last week, wiping off last week’s inflow of RM345.1mil net.
“It was the first time foreign investors sold more than RM400mil for this year, making it the largest withdrawal so far. The last time foreign selling reached such levels was back in end-December 2016,” MIDF said in its weekly fund flow report.
The research house said foreign investors were net sellers on three out of four trading days last week. Wednesday recorded the highest outflow in a day since June 30 that amounted to RM221mil net.
On the same day, the FTSE Bursa Malaysia KL Composite Index slid 0.17% to close at 1,773 points, mainly dragged by CIMB which had its Japanese shareholder, Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group, selling its entire stake through an overnight block trade.
MIDF said the weekly outflow was in conformity with those seen by South-East Asian peers, notably Thailand and Indonesia.
Due to last week’s massive outflow, the cumulative net inflow thus far this year into shares listed on Bursa went below RM11bil to RM10.6bil.
“Nonetheless, outflows have only been recorded in nine out of 38 weeks, which is a safe level,” MIDF said.
Foreign participation rate dipped last week amid the surge in outflows. The foreign average daily trade value (ADTV) declined by a staggering 24% to retreat below the RM1bil mark to settle at RM861mil.
In contrast, retail participation remained healthy for the week. The retail ADTV increased by 7% from RM940mil to breach the RM1bil mark for the first time in 17 weeks.
Last week, CIMB registered the highest net money inflow of RM13.01mil. Genting Malaysia recorded the second-highest net money inflow of RM12.58mil while Maybank saw the third-highest net money inflow of RM7.99mil.
On the other hand, Genting Bhd saw the largest net money outflow of RM14.54mil last week.
IOI Corp recorded the second-largest net money outflow of RM11.19mil during the week under review and Tenaga Nasional registered the third-largest net money outflow at RM10.91mil.