KUALA LUMPUR: The downward pressure on the domestic market is set to continue amid the volatility on Wall Street as investors take profit and reposition themselves into smaller caps.
"A consolidation may take place with the key index looking to defend the 1,630 pts as the recent rally took a breather," said Apex Securities Research.
In the previous session, the FBM KLCI fell over five points before bouncing back to end on a flat note.
Apex expects the investor sentiment to continue to sour as the US markets experienced another day of heavy selling overnight.
The Dow Jones dropped more than 500 points while the S&P500 and Nasdaq were both in the red for a second day as investors took cash out of Big Tech to put into smaller firms, which are expected to most benefit from highly anticipated rate cuts in September.
On the Malaysian Exchange, the benchmark index opened 0.25 points higher at 1,634.06.
There was some upside action in banks, including Maybank up to sen to RM10.12 and Hong Leong Bank gaining four sen to RM19.04.
YTL Power rose five sen to RM4.85 while Press Metal
climbed eight sen to RM5.58.
Meanwhile, Gamuda jumped 12 sen to RM8.40
Of actives, MYEG dropped 0.5 sen to 99.5 sen, SCIB rose 2.5 sen to 30.5 sen and Dataprep was flat at 23 sen.
