BURSA Malaysia held on at a two-month high on Wednesday amid strong investors’ appetite, in sync with the regional bourses’ performance and rally in the oil market.
At 5pm, the benchmark FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) climbed 16.43 points to the day’s high of 1,569.80 from Tuesday’s close of 1,553.37.
The market bellwether opened 1.21 points higher at 1,554.58, which was also its lowest level for the day.
Market breadth was fairly mixed with 532 decliners and 509 gainers, while 468 counters were unchanged, 742 untraded and nine others suspended.
Turnover was unchanged at 4.55 billion shares, but the value slid to RM2.89 bil from RM3.15 bil on Tuesday.
Bank Islam Malaysia Bhd economist Adam Mohamed Rahim said political stability was seen to be strengthening, with the next anticipated matter being the new line-up of cabinet ministers.
“Among the constituents of the FBM KLCI, Press Metal led gainers with a 4.8% advance followed by Tenaga Nasional Bhd (TNB), which gained 3.1% during the day, while the Bursa Malaysia Industrial Products and Services Index recorded the largest gain of 1.7% among sectoral indexes,” he said.
Overseas, investors lauded positive US vaccination news, whereby the US Food and Drug Administration on Monday issued full approval for the Pfizer/BioNTech two-dose vaccine.
Other countries such as China have also been exhibiting encouraging prospects in terms of the handling of COVID-19 with no cases of locally transmitted infections in the latest data.
In addition, Brent crude oil prices stayed above US$70 a barrel, boosting selected energy counters.
Among the heavyweights, Press Metal Aluminium Holdings Bhd surged 24 sen to RM5.24, TNB jumped 31 sen to RM10.28, Petronas Chemicals Group Bhd was 21 sen stronger at RM8.15, Maxis Bhd added 12 sen to RM4.65, and Axiata Group Bhd gained nine sen to RM4.04.
Meanwhile, Malayan Banking Bhd (Maybank) increased one sen to RM8.33 and Public Bank Bhd dropped one sen to RM4.10.
Among the actives, Kanger International Bhd and Sapura Energy Bhd were flat at six sen and 12 sen respectively, MMAG Holdings Bhd went down one sen to 10.5 sen, Focus Dynamics Group Bhd increased half-a-sen to five sen, and Avillion Bhd lost two sen to 13.5 sen. – Aug 25, 2021.
