PETALING JAYA: Foreign funds exit from Bursa Malaysia intensified for the third week as they sold RM770.8 million net of local equities, the highest outflow in eight weeks.
It was also more than a four fold increase from the RM150.9 million outflow reported for the preceding week.
According to MIDF Research, the local bourse ended the third quarter on a weak note as foreign investors sold RM72.3 million net of local equities on Monday.
“Jitters came from news on President Trump’s talk of delisting Chinese firms from the US markets in the preceding week,” said the research house in a report.
With that, September saw a total foreign net outflow of RM559 million, the second lowest monthly foreign net outflow so far in 2019.
On Tuesday, Bursa started Q4 on the right foot with a slight gain of 0.4%, snapping two days of losses.
However, the FBM KLCI was still the smallest gainer amongst regional peers due to the foreign net outflow of RM74.2 million.
Foreign net selling accelerated further to RM168.0 million on Wednesday, while the sentiment on Thursday was affected by the US factory gauge hitting the weakest point since the end of the last recession and news of the US is set to slap US$7.5 billion (RM31.4 billion) worth of tariffs on European imports.
“As such, offshore investors dumped RM266.5 million net on Thursday, the highest daily foreign net outflow in more than a month.”
MIDF said Friday saw foreign investors dispose of RM189.7 million of local equities, extending the foreign net selling spree to the sixth day as Malaysia’s import in September reached the lowest level since 2009.
Subsequently, the local bourse followed suit to close at 1,557.7 points on the same day, a level not seen in four years.
On a year-to-date basis, international funds have taken out RM8.6 billion worth of local equities from Bursa, making up 74.0% of last year’s foreign outflow of RM11.69 million.
