Bursa Malaysia Opens Higher, Tracks Wall Street Gains

By Abdul Hamid A Rahman

KUALA LUMPUR, Aug 28 (Bernama) -- Bursa Malaysia was higher in early trade today, tracking the upbeat performance on Wall Street overnight.

At 9.10 am, the FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) added 4.83 points to 1,592.74 after closing at 1,587.91 yesterday.

The index had opened 1.35 points higher at 1,589.26.

Market breadth was positive, with 204 advancers edging out 180 decliners. Another 274 counters were unchanged, 1,986 untraded and 112 suspended.

Turnover was 183.63 million shares worth RM141.54 million.

Rakuten Trade Sdn Bhd vice-president of equity research Thong Pak Leng said Wall Street closed on a high yesterday, with sentiment boosted by expectations of a Federal Reserve rate cut next month.

“Nonetheless, tech bellwether Nvidia fell in extended trading despite posting solid earnings as traders were concerned about its purported sales of chips to China.

“Meanwhile, the US 10-year yield eased to 4.24 per cent,” he told Bernama.

On the home front, Thong said the FBM KLCI reversed the previous day’s losses to close at the day’s high, supported by apparent local institutional buying.

“Contrary to our initial concerns, we deem this immediate rebound encouraging as it demonstrated the market’s resilience. We expect the index to trend within the 1,590–1,605 range today,” he added.

Among heavyweights, Maybank rose 11 sen to RM9.90, Public Bank added three sen to RM4.36, and CIMB Group improved one sen to RM7.47.

Meanwhile, Tenaga Nasional eased four sen to RM13.44, and IHH Healthcare was flat at RM6.79.

In actively traded stocks, Sime Darby climbed six sen to RM1.96, and Tanco Holdings added half-a-sen to 72.5 sen. Nationgate Holdings shrank three sen to RM1.37, and Ekovest eased one sen to 37.5 sen, while TWL Holdings was flat at 2.5 sen.

On the index board, the FBM Emas Index advanced 27.83 points to 11,817.07, the FBMT 100 Index rose 30.60 points to 11,591.44, the FBM Emas Shariah Index improved 5.76 points to 11,777.62, and the FBM 70 Index increased 23.50 points to 16,593.09 while the FBM ACE Index slipped 4.81 points to 4,742.14.

Sector-wise, the Financial Services Index jumped 130.34 points to 18,212.90, and the Plantation Index added 27.88 points to 7,607.28. The Industrial Products and Services Index eased 0.51 of-a-point to 164.03, and the Energy Index narrowed 0.44 of-a-point to 747.69.

-- BERNAMA