Bursa Malaysia opened the week on a positive note, in sync with the performance of Wall Street and the oil market.
At 9.08am, the benchmark FBM KLCI rose 5.03 points to 1,620.72 versus Friday’s close of 1,615.69.
The index opened 3.93 points higher at 1.619.62.
On the broader market, gainers outpaced losers 393 to 208, while 353 counters were unchanged, 1,241 untraded and 11 others suspended.
Malacca Securities expects the commodity and oil and gas counters to get a boost as crude palm oil hit multi-year highs, while crude Brent oil continued to hover near US$70 per barrel.
Overall, the market sentiment on the local bourse will remain cautious ahead of the upcoming US Federal Reserve meeting, where it will deliver its decision on interest rate.
“Despite the key index may be trading on a cautious mode, traders may still look into recovery-themed stocks such as the consumer, banking and construction sectors amid lower Covid-19 daily confirmed cases, which is currently below the 2,000 level,” it said in a note.
Meanwhile, the technology sector saw a mild pullback in the early trade after its four-day rallies, mirroring the losses on Nasdaq overnight.
The US stock markets finished mostly higher as the Dow rose 0.9 per cent with the rollout of Covid-19 vaccines making positive progress, but the volatility in technology stocks kept a lid on the S&P 500 (+0.1 per cent) gains and sent the Nasdaq lower (-0.6 per cent).
Among the heavyweights, PetChem gained 11 sen to RM8.38, and Maybank, CIMB and Press Metal added six sen each to RM8.46, RM4.53 and RM10.12, respectively.
Top Glove went up four sen to RM5.24, while Public Bank, IOI and TM lost one sen to RM4.31, RM4.22 and RM6.02, respectively.
Of the actives, GFM Services dropped 3.5 sen to 43.5 sen, Dynaciate rose half-a-sen to 15.5 sen, Dagang Nexchange advanced four sen to RM1.01, and Lambo was unchanged at 2.5 sen.
On the index board, the FBM Emas Index inched up 21.53 points to 11,893.66, the FBMT 100 was 27.57 points higher at 11,566.44, and the FBM Emas Shariah ticked up 28.49 points to 13,164.49.
The FBM 70 was 4.95 points better at 15,656.95 and the FBM ACE declined 36.65 points to 10,628.54.
Sector-wise, the Financial Services Index expanded 57.20 points to 15,607.06, the Plantation Index improved 22.23 points to 7,159.01, and the Industrial Products and Services Index gained 1.42 points to 193.52. — BERNAMA
