KUALA LUMPUR: The FBM KLCI held on to its early morning lead to close the early session 6.33 points higher at 1,678.46.
Positivity over the recent US-China trade truce and an agreement to resume negotiations have bolstered global equities, giving the domestic market further catalyst for a rally.
Trading volume on Bursa Malaysia was 1.95 billion shares valued at RM1.05bil. There were 519 gainers, more than twice the 208 declining counters, while 346 stocks remained unchanged.
Most bank stocks started the second half of 2019 on a stronger footing. Maybank rose two sen to RM8.90, Public Bank gained two sen to RM23.02, CIMB added one sen to RM5.39 while RHB jumped 20 sen to RM5.79.
Hong Leong Bank was a laggard, losing two sen to RM18.98.
Petronas Chemicals was a leading gainer with a 14 sen advance to RM8.54 while Petronas Gas added two sen to RM17.38.
Plantation counters were laggards in the morning session led by Sime Darby Plantation
's seven sen loss to RM4.85. IOI dropped two sen to RM4.23, KL Keping lost eight sen to RM24.48 and PPB shaved 14 sen to RM18.56.
In regional indices, the Shanghai Composite Index was expectedly bullish, rising 1.9%, while the CSI300 Index jumped 2.5%.
Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index however down 0.3% as the city experienced violent protests on the anniversay of the state's handover to Chinese rule.
Japan's Nikkei Index was similarly positive, rising 2% while South Korea's Kospi Index was mostly flat as Japan tightened curbs on exports of smartphone materials to the country.
Oil prices have been shored up by an improvement in global sentiment, while Russia's announcement that it had agreed with Saudi Arabia to extend supply cuts gave the commodity a further boost.
Brent crude climbed US$1.55 a barrel to US$66.29 while US crude jumped US$1.37 to US$59.84 a barrel.
The ringgit was flat against the US dollar at 4.1340 but was seen to maintain an upside bias given recent developments in global monetary policy.
The local currency was down 0.2% against the pound sterling at 5.2499 and up 0.1% against the Singapore dollar at 3.0548.
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