Bursa Malaysia to trade range-bound this week on cautious sentiment

KUALA LUMPUR, March 13 (Bernama): Bursa Malaysia is expected to see range-bound trading this week as investor sentiment is likely to remain cautious due to market volatility and progress on the Russian-Ukraine conflict, a dealer said.

Rakuten Trade Sdn Bhd vice-president of equity research Thong Pak Leng said the investor sentiment would remain jittery although bargain-hunting activities may emerge as well.

"As such, we expect the FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) to be hovering within the 1,560-1,580 range for the week,” he told Bernama.

Technically, he said the local bourse would see immediate support at 1,550 and resistance at 1,600.

For the week just ended, the FBM KLCI was mostly lower, especially on Monday during which it slumped 37.53 points to its intraday low of 1,565.57 at closing, as the Russian-Ukraine tensions continued to hurt investor sentiment.

However, the announcement on the reopening of Malaysia's borders on April 1, 2022 had somewhat lifted market sentiment on Wednesday.

The move is in line with the government’s plan on entering the 'Transition to Endemic' phase, as well as efforts to revive the overall national economy, especially the tourism industry which was badly hit by the pandemic.

The local market was negatively impacted by the continued spike in crude oil prices as Western governments imposed sanctions to isolate Russia by taking steps to cut it off from global oil markets.

This drove oil prices to surge to near 14-year high, with the global benchmark Brent crude hitting US$139 per barrel on Monday, sparking concerns on inflation.

To ease the situation, the United Arab Emirates together with the Organisation of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and Allies maintained their commitment to boost oil supply by 400,000 barrels a day per month to fill the supply gap due to the Russia-Ukraine war.

On a Friday-to-Friday basis, the FBM KLCI shrank 35.72 points to end the week at 1,568.22 from 1,603.94 in the previous week.

On the index board, the FBM Emas Index dipped 316.49 points to 11,762.88, the FBMT100 Index slid 213.91 points to 10,817.22, the FBM Emas Shariah Index fell 316.49 points to 11,762.88, the FBM 70 reduced 114.45 points to 13,072.74, and the FBM ACE lost 249.58 points to 5,258.48.

Sector-wise, the Financial Services Index shed 143.21 points to 16,250.02, the Energy Index slipped 32.33 points to 707.48, and the Plantation Index gave up 342.81 points to 8,204.70.

The Industrial Products and Services Index eased 8.53 points to 204.69, the Technology Index erased 0.17 of-a-point to 71.53, and the Healthcare Index declined 84.81 points to 1,997.23.

Weekly turnover widened to 17.33 billion units worth RM16.71 billion from 16.80 billion units worth RM17.96 billion in the previous week.

The Main Market volume rose marginally to 11.85 billion shares valued at RM15.55 billion versus 11.78 billion shares valued at RM16.77 billion previously.

Warrants volume grew to 2.09 billion units worth RM288.95 million from 1.70 billion units worth RM212.45 million last week.

The ACE Market volume increased to 3.36 billion shares worth RM863.88 million against 3.29 billion shares worth RM976.09 million in the previous week.- Bernama