KUALA LUMPUR: Bursa Malaysia ended trading at an intraday low and snapped its three-day winning streak yesterday, following the lacklustre performance seen across the region, says an analyst.
At 5pm, the FBM KLCI fell 8.68 points to 1,544.96 from Monday’s close of 1,553.64.
The benchmark index opened 2.05 points easier at 1,551.59 and reached its intraday high of 1,552.10 during the mid-morning session.
However, market breadth was positive with gainers leading decliners 510 to 502, while 486 counters were unchanged, 796 untraded and nine others suspended.
Turnover declined to 4.06 billion units worth RM3.09bil from 4.24 billion units worth RM2.79bil on Monday.
Rakuten Trade Sdn Bhd equity research vice-president Thong Pak Leng said key regional indices mostly ended lower due to concerns about potentially hawkish signals from the US Federal Reserve (Fed).
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index eased 1.24% to 16,529.48, South Korea’s Kospi slipped 1.10% to 2,656.17 and China’s SSE Composite Index slid 0.72% to 3,062.76.
“Additionally, investors are anticipating policy decisions from central bank officials in the United States, Taiwan, Indonesia, Turkiye, Russia, Brazil and Mexico, among others, later in the week,” he told Bernama.
On the local front, Thong believes that investor sentiment would remain steady, given the strong support from local institutions despite the sell-off yesterday.
“Having said that, we prefer to stay prudent, given the increasing market volatility, and expect the benchmark index to stay in consolidation mode until more clarity emerges.
“As such, we maintain our weekly FBM KLCI target between 1,540 and 1,570 levels,” he said.