KUALA LUMPUR: Asian markets were a sea of red on Monday, led by Chinese and South Korean markets.
While Chinese markets have been jittery since the announcement of new asset regulations by the authorities, South Korean tech shares fell amid a report that the memory chip "super cycle" would soon be over.
The FBM KLCI drifted lower, moving down 3.74 points by midday to 1,713.49 points.
Turnover was 894.24 million shares valued at RM647.33mil. There were 348 decliners to 254 advancers and 488 counters unchanged.
Petronas Gas fell 32 sen to RM16.44 and shaved 1.0381 points off the index.
Petronas Chemicals was another leading laggard, falling five sen to RM7.30. Meanwhile, Genting slipped 10 sen to RM9.10
Gainers included Maybank, which rose four sen to RM9.19. Digi also rose following the a pullback on Friday after it was removed from the Shariah-compliant list of equities. At 12.30pm, it was up 10 sen to RM4.51.
On the wider market, Supermax fell on news that its managing director, Stanley Thai, had been convicted for insider trading. Despite reassurances from the glove maker that it was "business as usual" for the group, Supermax slipped 14 sen to RM1.95.
Shangri-La Hotels also fell 11 sen to RM5.03 while CSC Steel dipped 11 sen to RM1.60.
Among leading gainers, Hartalega
rose 15 sen to RM9.50, Prestariang added 13 sen to RM1.48 and Thong Guan Industries gained 15 sent o RM4.39.
Crude oil prices slipped on Monday on expectations of higher US production. US light oil dropped 26 cents to US$58.69 a barrel and Brent crude slipped four cents to US$63.82 a barrel.
In currencies, the ringgit was trading unchanged against the US dollar at 4.1165. It strengthened 0.08% against the pound sterling at 5.4815 and weakened 0.08% against the Singapore dollar at 3.0583.
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