KUALA LUMPUR: Profit taking of telcos and Genting dragged the FBM KLCI deeper into the red at the close of trade on Tuesday but fund support for Tenaga Nasional helped shore up the index.
At 5pm, the KLCI was down 3.26 points or 0.19% to 1,687.68. Turnover declined to 2.89 billion shares valued at RM1.75bil.
The broader market was also weaker as decliners beat advancers 2.5 to one, with 622 losers to 241 gainers while 374 counters were unchanged.
Key Asian markets were mixed with Japan, China, South Korea in the red but Hong Kong eked ut some gains.
Earlier in the day, Prime Minister Tun Dr Mahathir Mohamad said the government was implementing several macro strategies to strengthen economic resilience.
Delivering his keynote address at the Invest Malaysia conference, he said the government will undertake a mid-year budget review where the criteria for off-budget allocation should be scrutinised. The government was also looking into listing mature unlisted government entities on Bursa Malaysia.
At Bursa, Maxios fell seven sen to RM5.40 and erased 0.85 of a point while Axiata lost six sen to RM4.19 and wiped out 0.85 of a point also and Digi shed two sen to RM4.65.
Genting Bhd
lost 10 sen to RM6.93 but GentingM edged up one sen to RM3.43.
IHH Healthcare fell one sen to RM5.84. StarBiz reported 1.403 billion shares were transacted in an off-market deal on Tuesday with a total value of RM8.418bil.
The transaction is believed to have marked the completion of Khazanah Nasional's sale of a 16% stake to Japan's Mitsui & Co Ltd.
Tenaga rose 14 sen to RM13.20 and powered the KLCI up 1.24 points.
Crude palm oil for third month delivery rose RM14 to RM2,119 per tonne. Sime Plantation was down one sen to RM5.09, PPB Group shed two sen to RM18.32, IOI Corp lost four sen to RM4.55 and KL Kepong 10 sen to RM24.92.
Nestle fell the most, down 70 sen to RM147.80 on profit taking but BAT was the top gainer, up 32 sen to RM34.58.
Dayang fell 24 sen to RM1.38 with 106.35 million shares done. The share price was the lowest since March 6.
US light crude oil rose 24 cents to US$59.33 and Brent added 33 cents to US$67.87.
Petronas Dagangan fell 26 sen to RM24.84, Petronas Gas six sen to RM17.70 while Petronas Chemical was unchanged at RM9.25. Dialog dipped one sen to RM3.19.
Semicon related stocks were among the top losers, with MPI down 22 sen to RM9.78 and Vitrox 16 sen to RM7.01.
Sapura Energy and its warrants fell 1.5 sen each to 34.5 sen and 13 sen while Bumi Armada was down one sen to 19 sen and Velesto gave up two sen to 28.5 sen.
Limited time offer:
Just RM5 per month.
