Bursa Malaysia Opened Higher, Market More Cautious This Week

<p>&nbsp;Bursa Malaysia opened higher this morning after continuing the positive performance from last Friday despite the movement of Wall Street being relatively flat.</p><p><br /></p><p>Stock markets in the United States had earlier closed almost unchanged following mixed sentiment on bank earnings to offset lower-than-expected inflation.</p><p><br /></p><p>At 9am this morning, the FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) rose 5.17 points to 1,492.51 from 1,487.34 last Friday. It opened higher by 0.94 points to 1,488.28.</p><p><br /></p><p>Overall, the market moved positively with gainers outnumbering losers by 251 to 159, 284 counters unchanged, 1,525 untraded and 20 counters suspended. A total of 287.94 million units worth RM152.36 million.</p><p><br /></p><p>According to Rakuten Trade Vice President of Equity Research, Thong Pak Leng said Wall Street closed mixed last week due to lower-than-expected bank earnings with low inflation readings.</p><p><br /></p><p><br /></p><p>He thought the buying of heavyweight stocks would continue after the correction in the last few days and saw the index in the range of 1,485 – 1,495 with 1,500 as a difficult level to break through.</p><p><br /></p><p>Malacca Securities Sdn Bhd said the overall sentiment on Bursa Malaysia remains positive as there are five consortia expected to present their proposals for the construction of the Kuala Lumpur – Singapore high-speed railway (KL-SG HSR).</p><p><br /></p><p>In the commodity market, the movement of Brent crude oil registered a small gain at the time of increased tensions in the Red Sea region.</p><p><br /></p><p>Among the heavyweight stocks, Public Bank added three sen to RM4.33, CIMB rose four sen to RM5.96, Tenaga Nasional rose two sen to RM10.30 and Petronas Chemicals gained one sen to RM6.93 and Maybank declined two sen to RM9.04.</p><p><br /></p><p>Of the active stocks, Hong Seng Consolidated rose half a sen to two sen and Ekovest added two sen to 61 sen while SC Estates, Minetech and Fast Energy declined half a sen to 2.5 sen, 19 sen and 15.5 sen respectively.</p><p><br /></p><p>By sector, the Industrial Products and Services Index rose 0.56 points to 176.42, the Financial Services Index increased 41.42 points to 16,591.46, the Energy Index added 0.46 points to 866.17, the Plantation Index increased 10.49 points to 7,112.42 and the Real Estate Index added 4.69 points to 897.48.</p>