KUALA LUMPUR: Last Friday's sharp sell-off on Wall Street weighed on the opening in Asian markets on Monday, including Bursa Malaysia.
The benchmark index dropped 5.92 points 1,647.2, grazing the 21-day simple moving average as the index flirted with the support.
"We expect the KLCI index to trade in a negative tone today, mirroring the sharp losses seen in Wall Street.
"Similarly, the lower liners are expected to be dragged down by softer sentiment as investors await new catalysts," said Apex Securities Research.
Meanwhile, the research firm said investors will be keeping a close tab on the release of US consumer inflation sentient as well as China inflation data later tonight.
"We advise investors to remain defensive and focus onto fundamentally sound stocks during the volatile period.
"Given the weaker-than-expected job growth, we prefer gold-related stocks, as we believe a rate cut is likely to be on the table at the upcoming central bank meetings," it added.
Blue-chip stocks undergoing a rapid retreat included YTL Power, falling 17 sen to 3.35 as it extended losses from the previous week, YTL Corp also dove eight sen to RM2.41.
Maybank slumped eight sen to RM10.72, Sunway shed six sen to RM3.88 and Tenaga Nasional dropped six sen to RM14.66.
Bursa Malaysia's technology sector was also underwater given the strong profit-taking on the Nasdaq last week. Greatech slipped six sen to RM2.22, MPI fell 36 sen to RM26.56 and Pentamaster dropped eight sen to RM3.60.
Leading the actives lives, market debutant 99 Speed Mart soared 22 sen to RM1.87.
Recent ACE-Market entrant Steel Hawk remained heavily traded, falling 1.5 sen to 37.5 sen.
