KUALA LUMPUR: Bursa Malaysia remained in the red despite some optimism in regional markets as trade tariffs imposed by the US were lower than initially expected.
At 12.30pm, the benchmark FBM KLCI was down 5.3 points to 1,528.05 as investors moved into profit-taking mode following last Friday's sharp rally.
The domestic market continues to move in consolidation mode as there remains a lot of uncertainty over the how much impact these tariffs will have on global trade and the economy, especially after a jobs report released by the US pointed towards a sharp decline in payrolls.
More than 500 stocks and seven out of 13 sectors slid into negative territory on the broader market. The morning session ended with a turnover of 1.67 billion shares valued at RM952.57mil.
On the blue-chip index, Tenaga Nasional slid 12 sen to RM13.18 while Sunway shed five sen to RM4.60.
Hong Leong Bank dropped 14 sen to RM19, Maybak lost five sen to RM9.55 and Public Bank dipped four sen to RM4.25.
Among actives, Trive was flat at one sen, Magma fell 3.5 sen to 38 sen and Pharmaniaga
dropped one sen to 18 sen.
Inari Amertron, seeing accelerated profit-taking after last week's rally, dove 14 sen to RM1.99.
In key Asian markets, Hong Kong's Hang Seng was up 0.49% to 24,627. China's composite index rose 0.2% to 3,567.
Meanwhile, South Korea's Kospi jumped 1.03% to 3,151 while Japan's Nikkei dove 1.46% to 40,204.
