KUALA LUMPUR: Malaysia's benchmark stock index was slightly higher at midday as investor remained cautious amid soft global sentiment for equities.
At 12.30pm, the FBM KCI was up 1.8 points to 1,420.56. There were 473 decliners compared to 298 gainers.
Trading volume was 1.87 billion shares vaued at RM1.07bil.
Bank stocks led the bounce with Maybank gaining one sen to RM8.76, Public Bank gaining three sen to RM4.09, CIMB adding five sen to RM5.45 and Hong Leong Bank adding four sen to RM19.50.
Other counters on the rise included MISC up four sen to RM7.07, Maxis adding three sen to RM4.06, IHH climbing two sen to RM5.80 and PETRONAS Gas climbing four sen to RM16.80.
On the broader market Amway surged 19 sen to RM5.48, Time dotCom rose 10 sen to RM5.56 and Genetec climbed five sne to RM2.48.
Top actives included KNM up one sen to 15 sen, EMCC rising three sen to 44.5 sen and Widad adding 0.5 sen to 51.5 sen.
In regional markets, Hong Kong's Hang Seng slumped 3% to 17,278 as it reopened after a national holiday. China's mainland markets remained closed for its Golden Week holiday.
In Japan, the Nikkei was down 1.5% to 31,279 while South Korea's markets were closed for a national holiday.
