Markets cautious ahead of Trump inauguration, UMW surges

KUALA LUMPUR:  Key Asian markets including Bursa Malaysia were subdued in early Friday trade as their ahead of US President-elect Donald Trump's inauguration later in the day.

At 9.31am, the FBM KLCI was down 0.54 of a point or 0.03% to 1,665.97. Turnover was 250.57 million shares valued at RM103.82mil. There were 133 gainers, 139 losers and 218 counters unchanged.

Reuters reported caution was the name of the game in financial markets on Friday ahead of Trump's inauguration, with Asian stocks and the dollar pulling back and US Treasury yields hovering near their highest close this year.

MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan slipped 0.1%, and looked set to end the week flat.

In commodities, oil rose after the International Energy Agency said oil markets had been tightening even more as cuts agreed by producers took effect. Still, gains were tempered by concerns about swelling US inventories, Reuters reported. 

US crude added 0.2% to US$51.52 per barrel, pulling further away from Wednesday's one-week low. 

UMW Oil and Gas fell 6.5 sen to 82 sen with 2.95 million shares done but UMW jumped 44 sen to RM5.06. Icon Offshore was the most active with 29.89 million shares done, jumping 3.5 sen to 47 sen.

UMW proposed to distribute its shareholding of 55.73% in UMW-OG to UMW shareholders and this is expected to be completed by April 2017.

MPI fell 16 sen to RM7.71, Petronas Gas 14 sen lower at FRM20.02, Genting Malaysia lost five sen to RM4.78 and Public Bank four sen lower at RM20.06.

Shell Refining continued to climb, adding nine sen to RM2.87 after the board and independent adviser told minority shareholders to reject the RM1.92 takeover offer.

Uli Corp jumped 23 sen to RM4.20 and Innoprise added eight sen to RM1.43 while Scientex gained seven sen to RM6.87.

TH Heavy rose one sen 16.5 sen in active trade.