KUALA LUMPUR: Trading volume picked up pace on Bursa Malaysia on Thursday, crossing the two billion units mark on strong speculative interest in penny stocks including mTouche which was recently queried by Bursa Malaysia Securities over the unusual market activity.
At 5pm, the KLCI was up 4.4 points or 0.27% to 1,648.98. Turnover was 2.05 billion shares valued at RM1.81bil. The broader market was slightly firmer with 449 gainers to 395 losers and 345 counters unchanged.
The higher trading volume was mainly due to strong trading interest while Vivocom attracted heavy trading activity, mainly due to traders. Vivocom counters accounted for about 300 million units.
Key Asian market were mixed with Japan and Singapore chalking up gains but the rest ended in the red. Hong Kong's benchmark stock index fell to a 10-week closing low on Thursday, following a dismal day on Wall Street, according to Reuters.
The ringgit advanced against the key currencies. It edged up to 4.0250 to the US dollar from 4.0350; it was firmer against the pound sterling at 5.8104 from 5.8185 and rose to 2.9387 to the Singapore dollar from 2.9456. It ended higher against the euro to 4.5917 from 4.5951.
Foreign funds have been reducing their shareholdings in Malaysian equities in recent weeks as they moved into the debt markets including government bonds.
However, Nomura Global Markets Research said that following the positive momentum in March, April data shows that inflows into Malaysia debt markets continued (RM6.2bil from RM11.5bil in March). Inflows were driven again by government bond purchases (RM7.8bil from RM10bil in March).
As a result, foreign investor ownership of government bonds (MGS and GII together) as a percentage of the total outstanding has reached a historical high of 33.4% (32.6% in March).
“We find it noteworthy that foreign investor ownership of MGS reached a new post-taper tantrum high of 49.1% (from 48.7% in March), while foreign investor ownership of GII reached a post-global financial crisis high of 8.5% (from 6.9% in March),” said Nomura Research.
Genting Bhd
was the top gainer, up 29 sen to RM8.75 and adding 1.83 points to the KLCI. Genting Malaysia added six sen to RM4.37.
Axiata rose seven sen to RM5.53 and added 1.04 points, Digi gained two sen to RM4.40, Telekom was unchanged at RM6.60 but Maxis lost 10 sen to RM5.49.
Among the banks, Public Bank rose four sen to RM19 but Hong Leong Bank fell 10 sen to RM13.30, Maybank lost three sen to RM8.82 while CIMB and AmBank shed one sen to RM4.67 and RM4.52. HLFG added 18 sen to RM15.12.
US light crude oil rose 27 cents to US$46.50 and Brent added 18 cents to US$47.78. Petronas Gas eight sen to RM21.38, Petronas Chemicals four sen to RM6.45 and Petronas Dagangan two sen to RM22.72. SK Petro rose five sen to RM1.63.
Power giant Tenaga fell four sen to RM13.96 and MISC was down eight sen to RM7.55.
Crude palm oil for third-month delivery fell RM23 to US$2,655 per tonne. Genting Plantations rose 16 sen to RM10.78, PPB Group six sen to RM15.64, IOI Corp four sen to RM4.23, KL Kepong two sen to RM23.10 but Sime Darby lost three sen to RM7.59.
Nestle was the top loser, down 50 sen to RM75.02 with 9,500 shares on some profit taking.
Boustead lost 18 sen to RM3.38, Apex Healthcare 14 sen to RM4, Top Glove 13 sen to RM5.08 while Takaful was down 11 sen to RM4.07 and Warisan TC 10 sen to RM2.25.
Tan Chong lost 12 sen to RM2.05 after posting losses.
mTtouche lost 2.5 sen to 13.5 sen and it was the most active with 125.96 million shares done. It replied to Bursa Securities that it was unaware of the reasons for the unusual market activity.
Vivocom rose 0.5 sen to 36 sen, its warrants WB added 0.5 sen to 22 sen while warrants WC and WD were flat at 27 sen each.
Among the key regional markets,
Japan’s Nikkei 225 closed 0.41% higher at 16,646.34;
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index fell 0.7% to 1,9915.46;
CSI 300 rose 0.24% to 3,090.14;
Shanghai’s Composite Index slipped 0.04% to 2,835.86;
Taiwan’s Taiex lost 0.34% to 8,108.05;
South Korea’s Kospi fell 0.13% to 1,977.49 and
Singapore’s Straits Times Index gained 0.46% to 2,745.39.
Spot gold fell US$10.213 to US$1,266.98.
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