KLCI extends gains ahead of holidays

Affin Hwang Investment Bank Vice-President/Head of Retail Research Datuk Dr Nazri Khan Adam Khan said investors are expected to begin their pre-new year shopping in the last week of 2015.

KUALA LUMPUR: The local stock market extended gains on Wednesday, on window dressing activities ahead of the upcoming holidays. 

At the close of the short trading week, the FBM KLCI was 20.25 points higher to 1,663.51 at 5pm today, its highest close since Dec 8. The stock market will be closed on Thursday for Prophet Muhammad’s birthday and Friday for Christmas. 

Turnover was 1.63 billion shares valued at RM1.635bil. 

The broader market was stronger with advancers outpacing decliners. There were 551 gainers versus 331 losers while 330 stocks remained unchanged.

The index was supported by oil and gas firm SapuraKencana, following its higher-than-expected normalised nine-month earnings. The stock was 5.85% or 10 sen up to RM1.81 with 12.1 million shares done.

Following SapuraKencana were Genting Malaysia up 19 sen to RM4.39 and DiGi.Com up 20 sen to RM5.30.

Banks were among laggers, with Hong Leong Bank leading the pack down 2.07% to RM13.24 while AMMB Holdings fell 0.23% to RM4.35. 

The ringgit weakened to RM4.3112 compared to RM4.3005 on Tuesday.

Both Brent crude and US crude last traded very closely, at US$36.45 per barrel and US$36.43 per barrel respectively. 

Crude palm oil’s benchmark third-month contract for March delivery gained RM10 to 2,478 per tonne from 2,468 the previous day. 

Among the key regional markets:
Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index is up 0.96% to 22,040.59;
Shanghai Composite Index down 0.43% to 3,636.09;
Taiwan's Taiex gained 0.28% to 8,315.70;
South Korea's Kospi up 0.33% to 1,999.22 and;
Singapore's Straits Times Index is up 0.33% to 2,862.50 points.

Spot gold loss 0.05% to US$1,071.85 per troy ounce.