Bursa pares losses but remains broadly lower

KUALA LUMPUR: The FBM KLC pared losses as it entered midday with glove stocks helping to shore up the index, which had been pressured lower on concerns over global lockdowns resulting from the spread of a new Covid-19 variant.

At 12.30pm, the benchmark index was down 2.11 points to 1,510.11 with sharp declines in commodity plays Press Metal and Petronas Chemicals.

Aluminium producer Press Metal shaved 28 sne to RM5.29 while Petronas Chemicals fell 23 sen to RM8.20.

There was also broad-based selling across the market's sectors, with financial institutions hit by the prospect of the recovery theme being derailed by the latest Covid development.

Maybank slid five sen to RM8.5, Public Bank lost three sen to RM3.97, CIMB shed three sen to RM5.07 and Hong Leong Bank dropped 16 sen to RM18.14.

The glove sector underwent a revival of fortunes, and went the opposite direction on speculation that a new wave of the pandemic would halt the declining demand for gloves.

Leading manufacturer Top Glove jumped 48 sen to RM3.12 while Hartalega climbed 64 sen to RM6.29.

On the broader markets, there were 578 decliners outpacing 229 gainers. Top actives were AT Systemization up 0.5 sen to six sen, DNeX down 0.5 sen to 81 sen and LKL rising 2.5 sen to 12.5 sen.

Meanwhile, Asian markets also reaction to the growing headwinds, tracking the dip in European markets in light of Wall Street's Friday Thanksgiving holiday.

Japan's Nikkei was down 0.75% and South Korea's Kospi slid 0.4%.

In China, the main index retraced earlier losses to approach midday on a flat note while Hong Kong's Hang Seng was down 0.5%.

Australia's ASX200 was down 0.3%.