KUALA LUMPUR: Investors could take a wait-and-see approach ahead of the Malaysia inflation report at noon today, which observers say could be impacted by the removeal of the blanket diesel subsidy.
Apex Securities Research said it expects a consolidation to take shape ahead of the consumer price index for June.
"The lower liners may attempt to build on the previous session recovery but we expect gains to be choppy as quick profit-taking activities come into the picture," it said in its outlook.
"Key focus remains onto the US corporate earnings releases over the interim," it said.
Meanwhile, the research firm expects weakness to prevail within the oil and gas sector with crude oil prices tanking for the past four sessions.
It also expects the construction sector to build on yesterday's recovery with the industry remaining robust.
At Wednesday's open, the FBM KLCI was up 1.63 points to 1,631.31 as investors held on to the previous day's gains.
Among the day's early gainers, Crescendo jumped 13 sen to RM4.20, Sunway Construction rose seven sen to RM5.11 and IGB gained five sen to RM2.59.
Top actives were MQ Tech up 0.5 sen to 1.5 sen, Velocity unchanged at 6.5 sen and Ekovest flat at 49 sen.
