KUALA LUMPUR: Heavy fund selling of MISC pushed the FBM KLCI deeper into the red at the close on Monday as sentiment was also impacted by the weak China data despite a recovery in the ringgit against most currencies except the US dollar.
At 5pm, the KLCI was down 17.17 points or 1.04% to 1,632.19 and year-to-date the 30-stock index was down 3.56%. Turnover was 1.69 billion shares valued at RM1.54bil. There were 336 gainers, 484 losers and 341 counters unchanged.
Hong Kong shares were firm on Monday, despite a second consecutive tumble in mainland stocks, as strength in many Asian markets and higher oil prices bolstered investor appetites, Reuters reported. While Hong Kong shares held steady, China stocks fell more than 2% to eight-month lows, as investors saw hopes for a solid economic recovery fade after the release of April trade data.
The ringgit fell against the surging US dollar to 4.0122 from 4.0043 last Friday but it strengthened against the pound sterling to 5.7897 from 5.8064 and it was at 2.9404 to the Singapore dollar from 2.9475 while it was at 4.5718 to the euro from 4.5760.
MISC closed down RM1.09 to RM7.25, the lowest since February 2015. It wiped out a hefty 8.34 points from the KLCI.
MISC's Q1, FY16 core net profit came in about 10% below expectations, due to the suspension of the Yemen LNG contracts from early-2016 and MMHE’s losses, says CIMB Equities Research.
US light crude oil rose 93 cents to US$45.59 and Brent added 72 cents to US$46.09. However, the gains did not provide relief to the Petronas stocks.
Petronas Gas fell 70 sen to RM20.90, Petronas Dagangan 40 sen to RM23 and Petronas Chemicals 20 sen to RM6.11. Their losses erased 7.16 points from the KLCI. SK Petro shed one sen to RM1.60.
Among the telcos, Maxis fell 17 sen to RM5.37 and erased 2.18 points, Axiata nine sen to RM5.40, Telekom three sen to RM6.60 and Digi was flat at RM4.40.
Crude palm oil for third-month delivery rose RM41 to RM2,669 per tonne. Chin Tek fell 35 sen to RM7.65, IOI Corp fell 14 sen to RM4.16, Sime nine sen to RM7.52, KL Kepong six sen to RM22.92 and PPB Group was flat at RM15.70. However, Genting Plantation added 14 sen to RM10.68.
Consumer stocks were the top gainers, led by F&N which surged RM1.18 to RM23.42, Dutch Lady
added 42 sen to RM53.42, BAT 22 sen to RM47.22 and Nestle 20 sen to RM75.20.
AirAsia X-WA was the most active with 95.7 million units done, adding two sen to 25 sen while AAX gained 1.5 sen to 37.5 sen. AirAsia advanced eight sen to RM2.10.
As for banks, Public Bank added 10 sen to RM19.06, Maybank nine sen to RM8.76, CIMB three sen to RM4.69 while RHB Cap lost 10 sen to RM5.80, Hong Leong Bank eight sen to RM13.28 and AmBank seven sen to RM4.45.
Among the key regional markets,
Japan’s Nikkei 225 rose 0.68% to 16,216.03;
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index added 0.23% to 20,156.81;
CSI 300 fell 2.07% to 3,065.62;
Shanghai’s Composite Index lost 2.79% to 2,832.11,
Shenzhen Composite tumbled 3.59% to 1,804.34;
Hang Seng China Enterprise shed 0.25% to 8,450.72;
Taiwan’s Taiex lost 0.18% to 8,131.83;
South Korea’s Kospi fell 0.45% to 1,967.81; and
Singapore’s Straits Times Index rose 1.29% to 2,766.06.
Spot gold fell US$11.25 to US$1,277.75.
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