KUALA LUMPUR: The FBM KLCI rose amid a regional rally as easing concerns over the global banking sector saw a resumption of risk appetite.
At 12.30pm, the key index was up 6.17 points to 1,415.26. There were 422 gainers compared with 345 decliners.
Trading volume was 1.66 billion shares valued at RM733.16mil.
Bank stocks led gainers on the blue-chip index, including Maybank rising four sen to RM8.55, CIMB gaining six sen to RM5.27 and Hong Leong bank adding 18 sen to Rm20.24.
IHH was up eight sen to RM5.83, Tenaga Nasional gaining seven sen to RM9.40 and Axiata rising four sen to RM3.
On the actives list, CFM rose three sen to 21.5 sen, BSL gained 1.5 sen to 5.5 sen and Hong Seng dipped one sen to 10.5 sen.
Meanwhile, Asian shares rose sharply on Wednesday on the back of bargain-hunting while Alibaba's stock soared on the internet behemoth's plans to split into six units.
Japan's Nikkei was up 0.7% to 27,707, South Korea's Kospi was flat at 2,435, and China's composite index was flat at 3,243.
In Hong Kong, the Hang Seng was up 1.9% to 20,162 and Australia's ASX200 rose 0.2% to 7,049.
