KUALA LUMPUR: The domestic market dove on Monday as it tracked the ongoing sell-off on Wall Street, sparked by fears the Federal Reserve may have put off interest rate cuts for too long.
At Monday's opening, the FBM KLCI dove 17.69 points to 1,593.36, breaching the 1,600 support level to a five-week low.
The sell-off was widespread with 28 of the 30 component counters deep in the red.
Tenaga Nasional shaved 44 sne to RM13.52, YTL Power dropped 29 sen to RM4.20, and Telekom Mlaaysia fell 18 sen to RM6.72.
In financial services, Maybank was down eight sen to RM10.16, CIMB dropped 12 sne to RM7.28 and RHB slid seven sne to RM5.64.
Nestle plunged another RM1.40 to RM109.10.
Meanwhile, leading laggards on the broader market included MPI down RM1.50 to RM33.50, Gamuda shedding 28 sne to RM7.36 and Kelington sliding 33 sen ot RM2.94.
Top actives were Velesto down 0.5 sen to 21 sen, EA Holdings
flat at 0.5 sen and PHB dropping 0.5 sen to 0.5 sen.
Apex Securities Research said it foresees a rotation of funds from lower liners to blue chip and index stocks.
It said it favoured the financial sector and REITs as safe havens during the current global market volatility.
"We remain positive about the outlook longer term for the local bourse due to active development in the country and the strengthening of the ringgit, despite the short-term sentiment being affected by Wall Street's performance," it said in a note.