IN a shortened trading week due to Merdeka public holiday, Bursa Malaysia continued to see net buying activities from foreign investors who net bought RM190.9 mil worth of equities last week, slightly lower than the RM244.6 mil recorded in the week prior.
This seventh consecutive week of net inflow from foreigners was also the second longest streak of foreign net buying for this year, according to MIDF Research.
“The longest streak was between the week ended Feb 11 and the week ended April 8 which amounted to nine consecutive weeks,” observed the research house in its weekly fund flow report.
“Foreigners were net sellers only on Thursday (Sept 1) at a rate of -RM90.1 mil but were net buyers for the rest of the week.
“The heaviest inflow of RM219.6 mil was recorded on Tuesday (Aug 30) while Monday (Aug 29) and Friday (Sept 2) saw inflows of RM61 mil and RM400,000 respectively.”
Bursa Malaysia was closed on Wednesday (Aug 31) in conjunction with the Merdeka Day public holiday.
The top three sectors that saw the most net inflow by foreigners last week were financial services, consumer products and services, and utilities at RM201.7 mil, RM58.4 mil and RM51.6 mil respectively.
Meanwhile, the highest net outflow came from industrial products and services at -RM102.8 mil, technology (-RM51.4 mil) and plantation (-RM26.6 mil).
On the contrary, local institutions remained net sellers for the seventh consecutive week after having net sold -RM233.2 mil last week.
The amount of stocks sold was -RM66.4 mil on Monday (Aug 29) and -RM252.2 mil on Tuesday (Aug 30) although local institutions turned net buyers when the market re-opened on Thursday (Sept 1) with RM79.1 mil and RM6.3 mil on Friday (Sept 2).
Notably, the sum was insufficient to offset the outflows posted on the earlier part of the week.
Meanwhile, local retailers were still on a net buying spree last week after having bought RM42.6 mil worth of equities. They were net buyers during every trading session except for Friday (Sept 2).
To date, international investors have been net buyers for 24 out of the 35 weeks of 2022 with a total net inflow of RM8.16 bil. Local institutions were net sellers for 28 out of 35 weeks, with a total net outflow of -RM10 bil while local retailers have been net buyers for 23 out of 35 weeks of 2022. Year-to-date, they have net bought RM1.84 bil.
In terms of participation, there was a decrease in average daily trade value (ADTV) among retail and institutional investors by -4.5% and -1.2% respectively while foreign investors recorded growth of +60.3% in ADTV.
In comparison with another three Southeast Asian markets tracked by MIDF Research last week, Indonesia posted the highest net inflow by foreign funds at US$163.40 followed by Malaysia with US$42.65 mil while Thailand and the Philippines encountered net outflows of -US$7.75 mil and -US$5.57 mil respectively.
The top three stocks with the highest net money inflow last week were Petronas Chemicals Group Bhd (RM3.29 mil), Time dotCom Bhd (RM1.55 mil) and Fraser & Neave Holdings Bhd (also RM1.55 mil). – Sept 5, 2022
