Bursa Malaysia expected to trade cautiously next week

Bursa Malaysia is expected to see cautious trading next week, with the benchmark FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) remaining well underpinned at the 1,880 support level with expectations of eventually marching towards the psychological level of 1,900.

Affin Investment Bank Vice-President/Head of Retail Research Dr Nazri Khan said the merger of three big banks, CIMB, RHB and MBSB should kick-start new government reforms and a liberalisation wave to boost investor confidence next week.

"On the technical front, the key index appears to be forming a bullish cup and handle pattern.

"The near term bias in the local index clearly goes to the bull camp, with resistance coming in at 1,890 and ultimately the 1,900 psychological level," he told Bernama.

On Tuesday, Nazri said the FBM KLCI had its best session in history in rebounding to the 1,896.23 level.

He added that the local index should carve out another quick tight consolidation of a 1,880-1,890 trading range over the next few days, before making another try to test the psychological 1,900 level.

For the week just-ended, the FBM KLCI declined 1.76 points to 1,883.15 from 1,884.91 previously.

The Finance Index rose 250.61 points to 17,470.57, the Plantation Index eased 67.68 points to 9,162.07, and the Industrial Index declined 6.46 points to 3,243.81.

The FBM Emas Index rose 24.3 points to 13,117.34, the FBMT100 Index added 15.84 points for 12,722.13, and the FBM Ace climbed 18.96 points to 6,754.33, with the FBM 70 soaring 124.74 points to 14,423.76.

Weekly turnover declined slightly to 8.89 billion shares valued at RM10.88 billion from the 8.98 billion shares valued at RM9.97 billion recorded last week.

Main market volume decreased to 7.1 billion units worth RM10.52 billion from the 7.32 billion units worth RM9.64 billion registered previously.

Warrants turnover improved to 380.77 million units valued at RM77.5 million from 116.33 million units valued at RM17.10 million transacted last Friday.

The ACE market volume depreciated to 1.07 billion shares worth RM231.9 million from 1.31 billion shares worth RM279.31 million traded last week.