KLCI edges higher early on Tuesday, oil prices dip

KUALA LUMPUR: Blue chips eked out small gains early Tuesday, with Petronas Dagangan and MISC among the gainers underpinning the FBM KLCI’s advance, but trailing behind the rally on the key Asian markets.

At 9.55am, the KLCI was up 1.44 points or 0.08% to 1,784.18. Turnover was 657.32 million shares valued at RM316.42mil. There were 335 gainers, 213 losers and 306 counters unchanged.

Asian shares joined a global equities rally, hitting a 10-year peak on Tuesday with investors breathing a sigh of relief as North Korean fears eased slightly and the worst-case scenario from Hurricane Irma looked to have been avoided, Reuters reported.

MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan gained 0.1% to its highest level since late 2007. Japan's Nikkei rose 1%.

Hong Leong Investment Bank (HLIB) Research said the trading tone on the local bourse would be fairly similar with the overnight performance on Wall Street and the KLCI could extend its gains towards 1,790.

“Traders may look into commodities related sectors such as steel, oil and gas and plantations for the time being on the back of firmer underlying commodity trends,” it said.

Meanwhile, oil prices edged down in early Asian trading, as traders weighed up the dampening effect on demand of Hurricane Irma versus refinery restarts following Hurricane Harvey that should lead to more crude oil processing, Reuters reported.

Brent crude was down eight cents to US$53.76 per barrel and US West Texas Intermediate fell three cents to US$48.04 a barrel.

Nestle was the top gainer, up 60 sen to RM85.50 with 100 shares done but Dutch Lady fell 50 sen to RM58.80 with 700 shares, BAT lost 22 sen to RM43.56 with 1000 units traded and Ajinomoto was down eight sen to RM19.04.

Hengyuan rose 19 sen to RM8.40 and Petron 15 sen to RM9.98. Petronas Dagangan added 12 sen to RM24.32 and MISC nine sen to RM7.38.

Lafarge rose 15 sen to RM6.30 as investo4s looked past its disappointing results and hoped that the construction jobs would provide the catalyst.

KESM added eight sen to RM14.82 but MPI fell 10 sen to RM13.90. Willowglen was eight higher at RM1.40.

Genting Plantations fell 16 sen to RM10.50 while Takaful, HLFG and Pos lost six sen each to RM3.87, RM17 and RM5.54 respectively.