Bursa Malaysia opens easier as weak sentiment continued

KUALA LUMPUR: Bursa Malaysia opened easier this morning, extending last week's downtrend as the cautious market sentiment weighed on investors' risk appetite.

At 9.05 am, the FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) shed 0.3 of-a-point to 1,501.25 from 1,501.55 at the close last Friday.

The benchmark index opened 0.03 of-a-point easier at 1,501.58.

On the broader market, losers inched past gainers 131 to 112, while 189 counters were unchanged, 1,826 untraded and eight others suspended.

Turnover stood at 104.09 million units worth RM34.27 million.

Rakuten Trade vice-president of Equity Research, Thong Pak Leng said sentiment in the market was clouded by the mixed closing on the Wall Street, due to fears of more aggressive rate hikes by the United States (US) Federal Reserves following a stronger-than-expected US job data last Friday.

He said although the Dow Jones Index Average rose by 77 points, the Nasdaq was down 63 points as the US 10-year yield jumped to 2.83 per cent.

"As uncertainties over the US' economy linger, we reckon the sentiment would turn cautious, hence we anticipate the benchmark index to trend within the 1,490-1,505 range today," he told Bernama.

Among the heavyweights, Public Bank added one sen to RM4.64 and Petronas Chemicals gained five sen to RM8.85, while Maybank, IHH Healthcare and CIMB were flat at RM8.89, RM6.43 and RM5.25, respectively.

Of the actives, Green Packet and Unique Fire perked one sen each to six sen and 23.5 sen, respectively, Zen Tech was flat at 3.5 sen and Dagang Nexchange inched up half-a-sen to 88 sen.

On the index board, the FBM Emas Index slid 1.04 points to 10,658.41, the FBMT 100 Index slipped 1.35 points to 10,404.33, the FBM Emas Shariah Index declined 8.8 points to 10,821.2 and the FBM ACE fell 32.15 points to 4,841.88, while the FBM 70 added 1.14 points to 12,776.8.

Sector-wise, the Financial Services Index rose 4.9 points to 16,635.23 and the Energy Index edged up 2.49 points to 655.52, while the Industrial Products and Services Index trimmed 0.3 of-a-point to 183.68, and the Plantation Index eased 0.13 of-a-point to 7,125.14.

-- BERNAMA