Bursa Malaysia ends above 1,600 level on craze for glove stocks

KUALA LUMPUR: Bursa Malaysia closed at its intra-day high yesterday, as appetite for glove counters intensified amid the resurgence of new Covid-19 cases globally.

At 5 pm, the benchmark FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) jumped 18.46 points, or 1.16 per cent, to 1,609.94 from 1,591.48 at Monday’s close.

The key index opened 3.16 points higher at 1,594.64 and hovered between 1,593.24 and 1,609.94 throughout the day.

Market breadth was positive, with gainers thumping losers 631 to 500, while 393 counters were unchanged, 485 untraded and 30 others suspended.

Trading volume widened to 11.85 billion units worth RM7.24 billion versus 11.61 billion units valued at RM6.23 billion on Monday.

A dealer said demand in glove counters surged a er the World Health Organisation directorgeneral Tedros Adhanom Ghebreyesus reportedly said on Monday that Covid-19 cases had doubled over the past six weeks, with nearly 16 million cases having been reported to the United Nations health agency along with more than 640,000 deaths worldwide.

Meanwhile, Rakuten Trade Sdn Bhd research vice president Vincent Lau said other than glove counters, positive news on the development of Covid19 vaccines also boded well for healthcare counters.

“Overall, market sentiment was positive, as we saw the trading volume surpassing 11.8 billion units today, which was mainly supported by buying interest in penny stocks that include technology-linked equities,” he told Bernama.

A er breaching the 1,600 resistance level today, Lau believed the bellwether would continue its uptrend for the rest of the week.

Among the 30 constituents of the FBM KLCI, glove maker Hartalega closed RM1.60 higher at RM19.90 a er shooting up to it its record high of RM19.92 earlier in the day. Similarly, Top Glove touched its all-time high of RM26.60 yesterday before easing 52 sen to RM26.40 at the close.

IHH bagged 28 sen to RM5.65, Petronas Dagangan improved RM1.24 to RM21.54 and Hap Seng was 30 sen higher at RM8.95.

Top gainers were mostly dominated by glove stocks. Apart from Hartalega and Top Glove, those on the list included Kossan which added 60 sen to RM17.30, Rubberex which accumulated 59 sen to RM4.59, Supermax which leapt RM1.56 to RM19.00 as well as several of its (Supermax’s) call warrants.

Of the actives, XOX climbed 3.5 sen to 28 sen, AT Systematization perked two sen to 9.5 sen, Key Alliance ticked up one sen to 10 sen and MQ Technology was three sen be er at 13 sen, while Borneo Oil was unchanged at 4.5 sen.