KUALA LUMPUR: Bursa Malaysia came under profit taking early Friday after net foreign fund buying rose to RM100mil the previous day, spurred by strong corporate earnings especially by banks and telcos.
At 9.31am, the FBM KLCI was down 8.93 points or 0.56% to 1,584.97. Turnover was 1.52 billion shares valued at RM568.03mil. There were 321 gainers, 339 losers and 283 counters unchanged.
Asian stocks and US equity futures rose early Friday after solid US economic data and President Joe Biden’s federal spending plans spurred a rally on Wall Street in cyclical shares, Bloomberg reported.
Japan led gains, jumping more than 1%, with South Korea and Australia also up. Industrial and financial shares helped the S&P 500 to a modest increase, while small-caps outperformed and the tech-heavy Nasdaq 100 slipped. S&P 500 and
Oil prices rose on Thursday, bolstered by strong U.S. economic data that offset investors’ concerns about the potential for a rise in Iranian supplies. Brent rose 59 cents, 0.9%, to settle at $69.46 a barrel. U.S. West Texas Intermediate (WTI) crude rose 64 cents, or 1%, to settle at $66.85 a barrel.
At Bursa on Thursday, foreign funds turned net buyers at net RM100mil and local retail investors at RM37.9m but local institutions were net sellers at RM137.9mil.
In early trade, MPI fell 82c to RM36.98, UWC 20c to RM5.39 and KESM 20 sen to RM11.78.
HLFG lost 54 sen to RM17.70, MFCB 30 sen to RM7.30 and Kossan 21 sen lower at RM4.09.
KPower extended its decline, down by nine sen to RM1.36 and SCIB four sen to RM1.18 following the voluntary suspension of Serba Dinamik
for the second day. The voluntary suspension was pending the release of further clarification announcement made on May 25.
Serba Dinamik group managing director and chief executive officer Datuk Mohd Abdul Karim Abdullah is a substantial shareholder in KPower and SCIB.
However, HL Industries rose 28 sen to RM9.77, Telekom 19 sen to RM6.09, Pharmaniaga also 19 sen to RM4.98.
Among the banks, strong earnings saw Maybank advance 14 sen to RM8.08 and RHB Bank six sen to RM5.21.
Refiners Hengyuan jumped 14 sen to RM5.56 and Petron 13 sen to RM4.66.
