KUALA LUMPUR: The FBM KLCI pared losses as it entered the lunch break after falling as much as 10.5 points in a heavy sell-off triggered by profit-taking in US Big Tech counters.
At the close of the early session, the benchmark index was down 4.44 points to 1,616.70.
On the technical chart, the index was seen bouncing off the 50-day simple moving average, before partially retracing the earlier losses.
It was another day of broad-based selling on the domestic market with 859 stocks in the red compared with 224 positive.
All sectors with the exclusion of REITs were in negative territory with technology stocks, expectedly, leading the decline.
The overall market share turnover was 2.8 billion shares valued at RM1.45bil.
Among the biggest laggards on the FBM KLCI, Tenaga fell 16 sen to TRM14.24, Kuala Lumpur Kepong shaved 30 sen to RM20.58 and Genting slid seven sen to RM4.65.
Other market laggards included Gamuda dropping 17 sen to RM7.92, NationGate losing 15 sen to RM2.12 and Atlan dropping 14 sen to RM2.60.
In the tech sector, Frontken dove 17 sen to RM4.17, MPI dropped 16 sen to RM38 and Greatec fell 16 sen to RM5.33
Top actives were Zentech flat at one sen, OCR up 0.5 sen to 11 sen and Artroniq down one sen to 20 sen.
Key regional markets were a sea of red, led lower by Japan. The benchmark Nikkei plunged 2.81% to 38,053, followed by Hong Kong's Hang Seng sliding 1.42% to 17,064.
China's composite index dropped 0.42% to 2,889 and Singapore's Straits Times Index slipped 0.77% to 3,434.
