Malaysian Stock Market Ends Lower

KUALA LUMPUR, Oct 24 (Bernama) -- The Malaysian stock market (Bursa Malaysia) continued its downtrend to end lower on Tuesday as medium- to large-capitalised stocks consolidated sideways ahead of the 2018 Budget due on Friday. At 5pm, the benchmark FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) fell 5.33 points, or 0.31 per cent, to finish at 1,736.14 compared with Monday's close of 1,741.47. After opening 0.97 of-a-point higher at 1,742.44 in the morning, the index moved between 1,736.18 and 1,745.48 throughout the day. Market breadth was negative with losers outpacing gainers by 599 to 276, with 409 counters unchanged, 567 untraded and 18 others suspended. Volume fell to 2.48 billion worth RM2.12 billion from 2.72 billion units worth RM1.95 billion on Monday. A dealer said the market remained stuck in sideways trade, with most investors remained on the sidelines to await fresh catalysts ahead of the budget announcement. Meanwhile, in a note today, RHB Retail Research said, the rebound recorded on the key index yesterday was just a reaction after the recent sessions' weaknesses. "This does not change the index's negative price trend which was nearing the critical resistance-tuned 1,727-point support level. "On our unchanged negative trading bias, we stay with our recommendation for investors to remain in short positions," it said. Of the heavyweights, Public Bank and Petronas Chemicals fell two sen each to RM20.44 and RM7.48, respectively, CIMB went down seven sen to RM6.11, while Maybank added one sen to RM9.25 and Tenaga was flat at RM14.30. Among active counters, Trive Property and its warrant fell 3.5 sen and 10 sen to 18 sen and 4.5 sen, respectively. Frontken rose two sen to 42.5 sen and Maxwell gained half-a-sen to 3.5 sen. PUC was unchanged at 16.5 sen. The top losers were BAT (-60 sen to RM42), Top Glove (-29 sen to RM6.39), Kluang Rubber (-24 sen to RM3.46), while Petron Malaysia and Panamy eased 18 sen each to RM11.44 and RM38.80, respectively. Sector-wise, the Industrial Index gave up12.36 points to 3,200.18 and the Finance Index erased 31.91 points to 16,257.71. The Plantation Index, however, surged 21.95 points to 7,926.90. -- BERNAMA