KUALA LUMPUR: The FBM KLCI rose into positive territory at midday as banks bounced higher from earlier losses.
At 12.30pm, the key index was up 5.69 points to 1,477.24. The market breadth however turned negative with 474 decliners compared with 345 gainers.
Trading volume was 1.85 billion shares valued at RM958.54mil.
Global markets were wobbly on Wednesday as investors hopes a recession could be averted in the coming year were dashed by negative projections from leading bankers.
Tracking a sharp fall in major US indices, Asian equities continued to back away from recent highs.
Japan's Nikkei dropped 0.75% to 27,728, South Korea's Kospi slid 0.1% to 2,391, and China's Composite Index slid 0.4% to 3,199.
Australia's ASX200 was down 0.5% to 7,256.
On Bursa Malaysia, Maybank rose eight sen to RM8.69, CIMB gained 14 sen to RM5.71 and RHB added 10 sen to RM5.70 to lead the market higher.
IHH was up eight sne to RM5.90 while Sime Darby Plantation
added four sen to RM4.35.
Among most actives, Borneo Oil was flat at two sen, Dataprep rose 0.5 sen to 31.5 sen and Advance Synergy lost 0.5 sen to 18 sen.
