Foreign investors pull out a staggering RM1.91bil

International investors took out RM1.91bil net of local equities last week.

KUALA LUMPUR: Bursa Malaysia endured another week of foreign funds outflow, in line with other regional peers, according to MIDF Research.

“Based on data from Bursa, international investors took out RM1.91bil net of local equities last week, ” it said in its weekly fund flow report.

The research house noted that Malaysia had the second least foreign net outflow on a year-to-date basis compared with the six other Asian countries that MIDF monitors.

“Last week’s foreign net selling brings the year-to-date foreign net outflow from Malaysia to RM5.21bil, ” MIDF said.

“The week started with Bursa seeing a RM459.9mil of foreign net selling on Monday. Monday’s sell-off was triggered by the slump in oil price due to Saudi Arabia, Russia and other oil producers failing to agree on cutting output, ” it said.

The pace at which foreign investors were selling local equities decelerated to RM257mil net on Tuesday.

Foreign net selling gained momentum on Wednesday to reach RM320.3mil

“The foreign net outflow continued to increase to RM375.4mil after the World Health Organization declared the coronavirus a ‘global pandemic’ on Thursday, ” MIDF said.

“Friday the 13th brought wild swings for Bursa as the local stock barometer faced its worst day since 2008, declining by 5.3% to settle at 1,344.8 points. As such, international funds dumped equities listed on Bursa at a tune of RM482.7mil net, ” it added.

In terms of participation, MIDF said the average daily traded value of foreign investors recorded the smallest gain of 13.1% for the week and remained at a healthy level of RM1.72bil.