Genting slumped 15 sen to RM6.80 and erased 1.01 points while GentingM was down three sen to RM3.25 following the recent corporate news which were viewed as negative by investors.
KUALA LUMPUR: Selling pressure picked up pace in late Monday trade, with Public Bank and Tenaga Nasional, bearing the brunt as the FBM KLCI fell below the important 1,650 level.
At 5pm, the KLCI was down 20.34 points or 1.22% to 1,641.62. Turnover was 1.47 billion shares as trading value shrunk to just RM1.18bil. Decliners beat advancers seven to nearly two or 690 losers to 179 gainers and 306 counters unchanged.
Stocks fell in Europe and US equity futures erased gains after a mixed session in Asia as markets looked to the Federal Reserve with the end of a volatile year approaching, Bloomberg reported.
Singapore's Straits Times Index was the top performer, up 1.21%, Japan's Nikkei 225 rose 0.62% China's Shanghai Composite added 0.16%, Taiwan's Taiex gained 0.14% and South Korea's Kospi advanced 0.08% but Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index shed 0.03%
At Bursa, consumer stocks topped the losers' list with F&N down RM2.70 to RM30.50, BAT fell RM1.32 to RM34.70 and Nestle 60 sen lower at RM144.50. However, Heineken gained 14 sen to RM20.50.
Public Bank fell 52 sen to RM24.22 and wiped out 3.58 points from the KLCI, RHB Bank 21 sen lower to RM5.16, CIMB nine sen to RM5.71, Maybank seven sen lower at RM9.30 while Hong Leong Bank was flat at RM20.40.
Tenaga lost 34 sen to RM12.92 and erased 3.4 points from the index, IHH five sen lower at RM5.35, MAHB seven sen to RM7.80 and Genting Bhd
shed three sen to RM6.04 but GentingM inched up one sen to RM2.80. Sime Darby eased a sen to RM2.31 and Aeon Credit lost 30 sen to RM14.90.
VS Industry stayed at the morning's low, hammered down by 30% or 35 sen to 82 sen after issuing a profit warning.
As for semicon-related stocks, Vitrox fell 28 sen to RM6.24 and Dufu 23 sen to RM1.97.
However, Selangor Properties rose 19 sen to RM5.52 after Kayin Holdings, the vehicle of the Wen family, raised the offer from RM5.70 per share to RM6.
Crude palm oil fell RM15 to RM2,123 per tonne in line with the weaker soybean prices. Sime Plantation was down 13 sen to RM4.30, IOI Corp 10 sen to RM4.18, KL Kepong six sen to RM23.94 and PPB Group two sen to RM16.88.
US light crude oil shed six cents to US$51.14 and Brent 10 sen lower to US$60.18.
However, some fund buying of Petronas Gas saw the stock climbing 60 sen to RM19.54 and nudging the KLCI up 2.1 points, Petronas Chemical six sen higher at RM9.18 but Petronas Dagangan lost 10 sen to RM25.50. Dialog was down seven sen to RM3.05.
Among the telcos, Digi was down 16 sen to RM4.19, Axiata lost nine sen to RM3.77, Telekom two sen to RM2.59 and Maxis eased one sen to RM5.24.
The ringgit rose against the US dollar but weakened against the other major currencies. It gained 0.17% against the greeenback to 4.1972.
However, it fell 0.15% against the pound sterling to 5.2701, down 0.2% versus the euro to 4.7352 and eased 0.02% to the Singapore unit at 3.0423.
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