KUALA LUMPUR: Blue chips closed lower on Wednesday amid a weaker broader market while the ringgit ended sharply higher against the US dollar.
At 5pm, the FBM KLCI ended 1.65 points lower to 1,738.95. The market traded within a range of 5.74 points between an intra-day high of 1741.47 and a low of 1735.73 during the session.
Decliners led advancers 659 to 258 while 349 counters were unchanged. Turnover was at 2.85 billion shares valued at RM2.19bil.
Foreign funds were net sellers on Wednesday at net RM76.55mil while local institutions were net buyers at RM100.2mil and retail investors took profit also with net selling at RM23.65mil.
Bernama reported that the ringgit ended sharply higher against the US dollar today, as the greenback remained under pressure following doubts among investors over US President’s Donald Trump tax reform promises and his preference for a “low interest rate policy”.
At 6 pm, the local unit stood at 4.3985/3015 against the greenback compared with Tuesday’s close of 4.4090/4120.
Meanwhile, Reuters reported that European shares recovered on Wednesday from their biggest one-day loss in five months, as a rebound in banking stocks and some positive first-quarter results outweighed weakness in oil and gas stocks.
Petronas Gas was one the laggards among the KLCI component stocks as its fell of 60 sen to RM18.70 dragging the 30-stock index down by 1.9548 points. Axiata shed 4 sen to RM5.05, nudging the index down by 0.5910. IHH Healthcare lost 4 sen to RM6 pushing the index lower by 0.5422.
Among the top gainers at Bursa Malaysia, Fraser & Neave added 58 sen to RM24.88, Far East gained 42 sen to RM8.99 and KESM rose 30 sen to RM13.20.
The decliners included British American Tobacco
, Ajinomoto and Panasonic Manufacturing.
Among the key regional markets,
Japan’s Nikkei 225 rose 0.07% to 18,432.20;
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index fell 0.41% to 23,825.88;
CSI 300 shed 0.48% to 3,446.08;
Taiwan’s Taiex eased 1.09% to 9,639.94;
South Korea’s Kospi fell 0.47% to 2,138.40; and
Singapore’s Straits Times Index ended down 0.36% to 3,126.28.
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