Share prices on Bursa Malaysia open lower

Share prices on Bursa Malaysia opened lower today as profit-taking on blue chips extended ahead of the weekend amid bearish Wall Street sentiments, dealers said.

At 9.05 am, the FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) was 8.77 points lower at 1,757.30, after opening 13.81 points easier at 1,752.26.

Market breadth was positive, with 104 gainers and 54 losers, with 115 counters unchanged, 1,324 untraded and 28 others suspended.

Turnover stood at 60.73 million shares worth RM34.96 million

HwangDBS Vickers Research said the market was taking a breather as the consolidation pattern on the local bourse was set to carry on for a while more.

"After a jump of 71.3 points or 4.2 per cent thus far this week, the benchmark FBM KLCI is expected to digest the recent gains by swinging between 1,750 and 1,785 in the meantime," the research house said in a note today.

It said that news flows to be out around today include the monthly plantation report for April.

Meanwhile, on the Wall Street, the key indices fell in the overnight trade as investors booked profit after a slate of successive record closes, snapping a string of five straight days of setting fresh closing records.

On the scoreboard, the Finance Index shed 65.379 points to 16,587.81 and the Industrial Index fell 18.5 points to 2,913.05.

The Plantation Index added 2.7 points to 8,293.80.

The FBM Emas Index declined 41.61 points to 12,096.62 and the FBMT100 dwindled 43.96 points to 11,913.56.

The FBM Mid 70 Index gained 12.18 points to 13,685.18 and the FBM Ace Index garnered 8.5 points to 4,177.43.

Perisai Petroleum added three sen to RM1.14 and Advanced Synergy gained half-a-sen to 14.5 sen.

Malaysia Airlines, GSB and Astral Supreme was unchanged at 36.5 sen, 8.5 sen and 19 sen, respectively.

Heavyweights, Maybank lost eight sen to RM9.90, CIMB shed six sen to RM8.25, Sime Darby fell 23 sen to RM9.28 and Petronas Chemicals slipped 20 sen to RM6.38 but Axiata earned five sen to RM7.