Foreign buying on Bursa ebbs

PETALING JAYA: Foreign investors acquired RM151.2 million net of shares in the open market last week, half of the amount in the week before.

MIDF Research said international investors continued entering Malaysia despite the selloff in some regional peers, notably Korea and Thailand.

“There was a bit of unease as international investors were selling at the start of the week. Nonetheless, the outflow was reversed by purchases from Tuesday to Thursday.

“We note that foreign buying peaked on Wednesday following optimism on Wall Street boosted by Apple’s impressive Q3’17 earnings,” MIDF said in its fund flow report.

For July, cumulative foreign net purchases amounted to RM420.9 million net, the second lowest monthly inflow for the year. With seven consecutive months of foreign buying, the cumulative year-todate inflow is nearing the RM11 billion mark at RM10.8 billion net. This has offset one third of the cumulative outflow from 2014-2016.

Foreign average daily trade value (ADTV) rose 11% from RM819 million in the prior week to RM895 million, hovering under the RM1 billion level for the fifth week running.

Meanwhile, retail ADTV increased by a substantial 37% from just RM648 million to above RM800 million for the first time in six weeks.