KUALA LUMPUR: Genting Bhd
advanced at midday on Friday, following fresh corporate news, but its gains were insufficient to halt the FBM KLCI's slide into the red.
At 12.30pm, the KLCI was down 0.9 of a point or 0.05% to 1,752.88. Turnover was 1.32 billion shares valued at RM744.62bil. There were 274 gainers, 315 losers and 469 counters unchanged.
Singapore shares were the sole gainers in Southeast Asia on Friday, hitting their highest in more than two weeks, as investors heaved a sigh of relief after quarterly economic growth data showed the city-state had narrowly dodged a recession, Reuters reported.
The ringgit weakened against the key currencies, falling 0.05% to the US dollar to 4.2945 and lost 0.23% to the pound sterling at 5,5626. It lost 0.23% also to the Singapore dollar at 3.1236 and she d0.09% to the euro at 4.8989.
Genting rose 22 sen to RM9.46 and pushed the KLCI up 1.38 points. Genting announced Thursday it was breaking ground on the US$400 million project near New York’s John F. Kennedy International Airport.
Genting Malaysia rose two sen to RM5.72, IHH was up three sen to RM5.98, Tenaga was flat at RM14.18, MISC shed two sen to RM7.38.
As for banks, Maybank and Public Bank were flat at RM9.61 and RM20.36, also unchanged was AmBank at RM5.07 while RHB Bank and CIMB added one sen each to RM5.06 and RM6.35.
US light crude oil fell 11 cents to US$45.97 and Brent was down seven cents at US$48.35.
Petronas Chemicals fell nine sen to RM6.86 but off the early low of RM6.80. The fall erased 1,18 points from the KLCI. Petronas Gas rose 18 sen to RM18.76 while Petronas Dagangan was flat at RM23.68.
Among the consumer stocks, Ajinomoto rose 38 sen to RM23.80, Nestle 30 sen to RM83, Apollo 15 sen higher at RM5.15.
As for tech and semicon related stocks, Globetronics rose 11 sen to RM6.32 but KESM fell 16 sen to RM16.02.
MLabs rose 3.5 sen to 40.5 sen with 57.4 million shares done and it warrants edged up 0.5 sen t 9.5 sen, prompting a query from Bursa Malaysia Securities.
Crude palm oil for third-month delivery fell RM17 to RM2,540 per tonne. PPB Group lost eight sen to RM16.64, KL Kepong fell two sen to RM24.68 while heavyweights IOI Corp and Sime Darby added one sen to RM4.50 and RM9.55.
Axiata and Digi each lost seven sen to RM4.56 and RM4.66, Telekom lost four sen to RM6.41 while Maxis shed two sen to RM5.50.
Among the key regional markets,
Japan’s Nikkei 225 rose 0.15% to 20,129.54;
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index inched up 0.07% to 26,364.21;
CSI 300 shed 0.08% to 3,683.99;
Shanghai’s Composite Index lost 0.18% to 3,212.46;
Hang Seng China Enterprise gained 0.16% to 10,694.46;
Taiwan’s Taiex shed 0.05% to 10,455.05;
South Korea’s Kospi rose 0.19% to 2,414.16 and
Singapore’s Straits Times Index added 0.56% to 3,253.72.
Spot gold lost 69 cents to US$1,216.89.
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