Bursa dips as blue chips come under pressure

BURSA Malaysia ended the week lower as most blue chip stocks were under selling pressure due to global economic anxiety and the lack of fresh local catalysts.

At 5pm, the benchmark FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) slipped 8.86 points, or 0.55 per cent, to 1,584.14 from Thursday’s close of 1,593.00.

The index opened 2.76 points lower at 1,590.24 and traded between 1,583.45 to 1,592.05 throughout the day.

Losers outpaced gainers 482 and 287, while 432 counters were unchanged, 800 untraded and 71 others suspended.

Turnover stood at 1.88 billion shares worth RM1.32 billion.

Among heavyweights, Maybank and PetGas slipped 10 sen to RM8.60 and RM16.48, respectively, Sime Plantation fell eight sen to RM4.80 while PetChem gained one sen to RM7.53.

Public Bank slipped six sen to RM20.04, CIMB Group weakened five sen to RM5.01, Hong Leong Financial erased 28 sen to RM16.10 and AMMB lost five sen to RM4.11.

As for the actives, MNC Wireless eased 2.5 sen to 8 sen, Bumi Armada declined 1.5 sen to 33.5 sen and MTAG fell half-a-sen to 13.5 sen.

The FBM Emas Index slipped 65.27 points to 11,205.89, the FBMT 100 Index contracted 65.72 points to 11,038.61 and the FBM Emas Shariah Index was 56.46 points lower at 11,761.17.

The FBM 70 fell 99.29 points to 13,930.71 while FBM ACE declined 0.7 per cent to 4,552.83.

Sector-wise, Plantation Index shed 50.58 points to 6,723.57 and the Industrial Products & Services Index was 0.16 point lower at 153.13 and the Financial Services Index dropped 125.90 points to 15,357.46

Main Market volume decreased to 1.14 billion units worth RM1.18 billion from 1.94 billion units worth RM1.47 billion on Thursday.

Warrants turnover increased to 335.30 million units worth RM82.87 million from 319.63 million units worth RM70.77 million previously.

Volume on the ACE Market increased to 404.66 million shares worth RM57.46 million from 397.30 million shares worth RM69.40 million on Thursday.

The FBM KLCI futures contract on Bursa Malaysia Derivatives ended lower yesterday, in line with the weaker underlying cash market.

At the close, spot month September 2019 decreased 3.5 points to 1,581.0, October 2019 slipped 3.0 points to 1,581.5, while December 2019 and March 2020 both erased 4.0 points to close at 1,584.5 and 1,583.5, respectively.

Turnover decreased to 19,070 lots from 29,475 on Thursday, while open interest declined to 48,927 contracts from 63,208 previously.