KUALA LUMPUR: The disposal of Bursa Malaysia equities by foreign investors extended into its seventh consecutive week to the tune of RM373.5mil net, despite a shortened trading week.
The net sales was about 11% more than in the week before, accumulated over only three trading days due to the Hari Raya Aidilfitri holiday.
According to MIDF Research, the weak sentiment on Wall Street amid stronger-than-expected inflation data, weighed on markets over the past week.
"This have driven further unpredictability on interest rate cuts by the Federal Reserve," it said in its weekly fund flow report.
The CME FedWatch Tool now shows a 94.1% and 71.7% probability that the Fed will keep rates unchanged in the May and June meetings.
Meanwhile, the market is divided over the prospective outcome of the July meeting, with a 43.5% probability of a stay and a 44.5% probability of a 25bps cut.
During the week, Asian markets mostly experienced net selling of foreign funds, with five out of the eight stock exchanges tracked by MIDF experiencing net outflows.
"Most of these inflows came from India and South Korea, with Thailand being the only other country to experience inflows," said the research firm.
On Bursa Malaysia, the top sectors that saw net sales by foreign investors were financial services (RM285.9m), utilities (RM85.4mil) and consumer products and services (RM52.7mil).
Sectors that saw the most net inflows were property (RM75.3mil), transport and logistics (RM26.8mil) and construction (RM16.5mil).
Local institutions, meanwhile, remained net buyers of domestic equities for the seventh straight week to the sum of RM430.7mil.
Local retailers were net sellers for the fifth consecutive week, with net sales of RM57.1mil.
In terms of participation, the average daily trading volume (ADTV) saw a decrease among local retailers (3.1%) and local institutions (15.2%), while experiencing an increase among foreign investors (3.1%).
