KUALA LUMPUR: Investors on Bursa Malaysia returned to a selling mood after a brief reprieve in the previous session, as the catalysts driving up equities prices ran their course.
At 12.30pm, the benchmark FBM KLCI was down seven points to 1,622,68, after bouncing off the intra-morning low of 1,619.71 at noon.
The midday rebound coincided with the release of Malaysia's inflation report for June, which showed the increase in consumer prices stood at 2%, unchanged from the previous month.
The horizontal movement in the consumer price index was welcomed by the market as economists had expected a higher rate of inflation following the government's removal of a blanket subsidy for diesel purchases in June.
On the securities market, all 13 market sectors slipped into the red, underpinned by 718 losing stocks as compared to just 237 gainers.
The morning turnover was 2.71 billion shares valued at RM1.39bil.
On the blue-chip index, Press Metal
dove 17 sen to RM5.24 while IOI dropped six sen to RM3.82 and Kuala Lumpur Kepong slid 14 sen to RM20.70.
YTL Power fell six sen to RM4.83, Tenaga Nasional slipped four sen to RM14.40 and Telekom was down nine sen to RM6.90.
On the broader market, Heineken slid 40 sen to RM22.84 and Dutch Lady lost 38 sen to RM32.22.
Theta Edge slumped 19 sen to RM2.46 and Unisem shed 11 sen to RM4.09.
Among actives, SC Builder rose one sen to two sen, MQTech gained 0.5 sen to 1.5 sen and Ekovest slipped one sen to 48 sen.
Regional markets were also in the red, with investors lacking trading direction and opting to sell after earnings disappointments from US tech giants Tesla and Alphabet.
Japan's Nikkei dropped 1.1% to 39,170, Hong Kong's Hang Seng slipped 0.62% to 17,361 and Singapore's Straits Times shed 0.11% to 3,457.
China's composite index gained 0.1% to 2,918.
