KUALA LUMPUR: Late buying lifted Bursa Malaysia to end at its intraday high Friday, in sync with the upbeat performance in regional bourses as market sentiment turned positive, fuelling investors' risk appetite.
At 5 pm, the FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) rose 6.88 points, or 0.50 per cent to end at 1,388.61 from 1,381.73 at yesterday’s close.
The barometer index opened 0.69 of-a-point firmer at 1,382.42 this morning and thereafter hit an intraday low of 1,373.15 during the mid-morning session.
However, the market breadth was negative as decliners outpaced gainers 451 to 397, while 462 counters were unchanged, 974 untraded, and 25 others suspended.
Turnover increased to 3.54 billion units worth RM3.25 billion versus 3.48 billion units worth RM1.80 billion on Thursday.
Rakuten Trade Sdn Bhd equity research vice-president Thong Pak Leng said the key regional indices trended mostly higher following a positive cue from Wall Street overnight, except for the Indonesia Stock Exchange which fell 0.23 per cent to 6,698.55.
"Additionally, investor sentiment has improved over the expectation that the US Federal Reserve is near the end of its rate-hike campaign,” he told Bernama.
Among heavyweights, Public Bank rose two sen to RM3.87, Tenaga Nasional was nine sen higher to RM9.20, IHH Healthcare improved 16 sen to RM5.96, while Maybank eased three sen to RM8.57 and CIMB slid two sen to RM4.98.
Of the actives, YTL Corporation put on five sen to 97.5 sen, TWL was flat at three sen, Top Glove slid 11.5 sen to 97.5 sen, Classita shed half-a-sen to 9.5 sen, and Sarawak Consolidated decreased 1.5 sen to 40.5 sen.
