PETALING JAYA: Bursa Malaysia ended the first trading day of the week on a positive tone, with the benchmark index rising 1.02% to more than an eight-month high, on broad-based buying momentum riding on the improving market sentiment regionally, says Rakuten Trade Sdn Bhd.
At 5pm, the FBM KLCI gained 14.74 points to end at its intraday high of 1,464.67 from last Friday’s closing of 1,449.93.
The benchmark index opened 2.46 points firmer at 1,452.39 and thereafter hit a low of 1,452.29 in the early session before moving in an upward trajectory.
The broader market stayed positive with gainers beating decliners 665 to 284, while 441 counters were unchanged, 961 untraded and 22 suspended.
Turnover increased to 3.76 billion units valued at RM2.34bil against 3.60 billion units valued at RM2.02bil last Friday.
Rakuten Trade equity research vice-president Thong Pak Leng said major regional indices also saw an upward trend, reflecting growing optimism that the Federal Reserve (Fed) has concluded its market-disrupting interest rate hikes aimed at curbing inflation.
In the meantime, the yield on the US 10-year Treasury retreated to 4.58% early yesterday, down from its peak above 5% two weeks ago, he added.
“On the domestic front, we are optimistic on the near to mid-term outlook of the local market given the improvement in the sentiment and the return of foreign inflows,” Thong told Bernama.
Meanwhile, SPI Asset Management managing partner Stephen Innes said the fall in the US bond yields and the fact that the US economy remained in perfect balance would mean that the Fed could be less of a factor influencing the policy going forward.
