Bursa opens lower on selling pressure

Share prices on Bursa Malaysia remained lower this morning on continued selling pressure especially by foreign investors, dealers said.

As at 9.18 am, the FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) was 21.8 points lower at 1,613.83 after opening 8.63 points weaker at 1,627.

HwangDBS Vickers Research said that, from a technical perspective, the key FBM LCI, which sank 40.8 points or 2.4 percent yesterday, was expected to remain under selling pressure.

"The benchmark index will probably pull back deeper towards the
psychological support line of 1,600 points ahead," it said in a research note, adding that the broad market sell-off yesterday was uncommon.

Losers thrashed gainers by a wide margin of 904-to-85 on heavy trading volume of 1.8 billion shares yesterday.

"This could mark the start of a trend reversal as pre-election jitters pick up ...," it added.

The Finance Index erased 240.38 points to 14,693.57, the Industrial Index lost 52.12 points to 2,678.14 and the Plantation Index fell 63.72 points to 7,922.06.

The FBM Emas Index trimmed 146.08 points to 10,972.92, the FBMT100 gave up 145.39 points to 10,825.26, the FBM Mid-70 Index fell 156.18 points to 11,930.43 and the FBM Ace Index was 60.79 points weaker at 4,081.69.

Losers led gainers 378 to 42 with 121 counters unchanged, 1,118
untraded and 23 others were suspended.

Volume stood at 103.72 million shares worth RM105.47 million.

Actives, Patimas Computers and RGB International eased half-a-sen to 12 sen and eight sen respectively, while The Media Shoppe and Nextnation Communication were flat at 8.5 sen and 9.5 sen respectively.

Heavyweights Maybank slipped nine sen to RM8.77, Axiata decreased two sen to RM6.28, Sime Darby shed four sen to RM9.18 and CIMB Group gave up 11 sen to RM7.13. 

- Bernama