KUALA LUMPUR: Tenaga Nasional's recent rebound faltered at midday on Thursday as some funds were quick to take profit, sending shares of the power giant to a low of RM12.22.
At 12.03pm, it was down 26 sen to RM12.28 – the lowest since end-May.
The decline in its share price weighed on the FBM KLCI, which fell 9.53 points or 0.58% to 1,641.21.
Turnover was 1.01 billion shares valued at RM729mil. There were 279 gainers, 365 losers and 314 counters unchanged.
Of the recent 11 research houses which covered Tenaga, Hong Leong Investment Research, UOB Kay Hian and KAF Seagroatt had a buy with target prices of RM13.65, RM15.10 and RM14.40.
Kenanga Research has an outperform and TP of RM13.40 and DBS Bank a buy with a TP of RM13.40 while Maybank Research has a buy and TP of RM15.50.
Bloomberg Intelligence said the near-term profit from the domestic power marketr couild remain stable as electricity demand in Malaysia increases steadily.
“Longer term more income from foreign investments will be needed to offset earnings uncertainty at home as the government intends to reform the power industry and perhap introduce competition, which will impact the utility's retail power monopoly.
“For now, income from selling power in Malaysia is protected from fluctuations in fuel prices, which can be passed though to end users via a tariff-rebate system,” it said.