Bursa M'sia opens higher, but retreats thereafter
KUALA LUMPUR: Bursa Malaysia opened higher, but retreated slightly thereafter on mild profit taking, as investors digested weekend developments in US-China talks, dealers said.
At 9.24 am, the benchmark FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) was 2.35 points lower at 1,852.15 from Friday's close of 1,854.50.
The index opened 3.81 points higher at 1,858.31.
On the broader market, gainers led losers 281 to 172, while 187 counters were unchanged, 1,244 untraded and 20 others suspended.
Volume stood at 352.46 million units valued at RM175.97 million.
A dealer said immediate fears of a trade war have likely been put to rest after US Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin said on Sunday that both countries were "putting the trade war on hold" as they worked out an agreement.
"Even as markets view this positively at the start of the week, investors will likely continue to be attentive to further developments," he added.
Among heavyweights, Maybank was down four sen to RM10.78, TNB dipped 20 sen to RM15.72, Petronas Chemicals slipped one sen to RM8.68 and CIMB lost five sen to RM6.75.
Public Bank, however, bagged 16 sen to RM24.54, while IHH Healthcare rose one sen to RM6.15.
For actives, Sapura Energy and MyEG perked 2.5 sen each to 78.5 sen and 95 sen respectively, GSB Group rose one sen to 14.5 sen, while Sumatec was flat at five sen.
The FBM Emas Index went up 14.215 points to 12,877.43, the FBMT 100 Index increased 10.56 points to 12,673.92 and the FBM Emas Shariah Index improved 12.85 points to 12,958.49.
The FBM 70 jumped 104.38 points to 15,056.75 and the FBM Ace advanced 38.60 points to 5,423.70.
Sector-wise, the Finance Index was 13.15 points lower at 18,315.14, while the Plantation Index increased 15.98 points to 7,938.22 and the Industrial Index fell 1.91 points to 3,301.98.
Gold futures contracts on Bursa Malaysia Derivatives were untraded in early trading.
As at 9.35 am, May 2018, June 2018, July 2018 and August 2018 stood at RM165.05, RM165.85, RM166.25 and RM166.35 a gramme.
Volume was nil, while open interest amounted to 46 contracts.
At 9.30 am, the price of physical gold was up 35 sen to RM159.55 a gramme. — Bernama