Bursa Malaysia rebounds on positive sentiment
KUALA LUMPUR: Bursa Malaysia opened higher this morning, reversing yesterday's downtrend, on positive market sentiment with buying seen in bluechips, dealers said.
At 9.05am, the benchmark FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) stood at 1,787.28, up 4.58 points, from Tuesday's close of 1,782.7.
The key index opened 3.09 points better at 1,785.79.
Maybank IB Research said there would be spill-over effects from the stronger close on Wall Street overnight onto the local stock market today, particularly in the small and medium capitalisation stocks.
"Technically, we expect the FBM KLCI to trade between 1,770 and 1,790 today. Downside supports are at 1,770 and 1,752," the research firm said in a statement today.
The overnight oil price climbed to its highest level since 2015, recording an intraday-high of above US$67 (RM270) per barrel on optimism over its continued rally into the new year.
A dealer said protests in Iran, which could possibly lead to geopolitical instability in the country, also helped push the oil prices higher.
Iran is the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries's third-largest oil producer.
Back home, market breadth was positive with gainers outpacing losers 228 to 78, while 196 counters were unchanged, 1,309 untraded and 19 others suspended.
Turnover stood at 220.96 million shares worth RM88.96 million.
Among heavyweights, Maybank added one sen to RM9.67, both Tenaga and Public Bank rose four sen each to RM15.26 and RM20.80 respectively, CIMB bagged six sen to RM6.56, while Petronas Chemicals was flat at RM7.85.
Of the actives, Hubline and MRCB inched up half-a-sen each to 14.5 sen and RM1.21 respectively, Ho Wah Genting added one sen to 7.5 sen and DRB-Hicom rose 10 sen to RM2.36.
On the scoreboard, the FBM Emas Index perked 32.29 points to 12,859.25, the FBMT 100 Index climbed 32.53 points to 12,520.94, and the FBM 70 chalked up 42.63 points to 15,877.9.
The FBM Emas Syariah Index rose 36.39 points to 13,209.98 and the FBM Ace gained 7.9 points to 6,719.93.
Sector-wise, the Finance Index improved 41.42 points to 16,853.02, the Industrial Index advanced 16.6 points to 3,286.12, while the Plantation Index increased 38 points to 7,952.38.
The physical price of gold as at 9.30am stood at RM165.05 per gramme, up RM1.27 from RM163.78 at 5pm yesterday. — Bernama