Tuesday, June 8, 2010

Selling on heavyweights

KUALA LUMPUR: Share prices on Bursa Malaysia closed lower on Monday, June 7 amid selling on heavyweights, led by MISC, Genting and YTL Corp, dealers said.

The FBM KLCI fell 8.12 points to 1,286.27. It had opened 9.88 points lower to 1,284.51.

A dealer said investors continued to pull back their positions following Wall Street's slump on disappointing US jobs data and fears that Hungary could face a debt crisis like Greece's.

He said the real boost for the market would come on Thursday with the announcement of the 10th Malaysia Plan by Prime Minister Datuk Seri Najib Tun Razak.

OSK Research said the outlook for FBM KLCI was expected to be bearish. The immediate resistance is between 1,290 and 1,304.

The Finance Index fell by 80.25 points to close at 11,562.20, INDUSTRIAL INDEX [] edged down 19.32 points to 2,576.32 and the PLANTATION [] Index slipped 4.58 points to 6,094.70.

The FBM Emas Index lost 56.979 points to 8,647.54, FBM70 [] declined 51.56 points lower to 8,547.06 and the FBM Ace Index shed 15.76 points to 3,768.29.

Decliners led advancers 463 to 151 while 206 counters closed unchanged. Volume fell to 491.949 million shares worth RM844.286 million from 674.177 million shares worth RM988.572 million last Friday.

Among key Southeast Asian markets, Indonesian shares fell to their lowest level in over a week'' and other Southeast Asian
stock markets also moved lower as resource shares came under selling pressure because of lower commodity prices.

Sentiment in the region was hurt by disappointing US job data and as fears mounted that European debt problems would worsen, pushing Singapore, Thailand and the Philippines down.

Not all investors were concerned, seeing losses in Asia as a buying opportunity.

"The last two years or year-and-a-half have shown us that the world is pretty tightly connected. You saw Asian markets hurting this morning on expectations around what's going to happen in Europe," said Graham Thomas, global head of Principal Investment Management at Standard Bank in Singapore.

"From a principal investing standpoint, we actually see it as a big opportunity. Typically a lot of the investments in our markets have not been driven solely by huge amounts of leverage," he said.

Indonesia's benchmark stock index fell 2.6%, at one point touching the lowest since May 27. Jakarta has gained 8.5% this year, Asia's second-best performer.

Vietnam fell 2.6% to its lowest in almost two weeks, with foreign investors buying shares worth a net $600,000.

In Singapore, top lender DBS fell 2.8% and bourse operator Singapore Exchange lost 2.3%.

In Bangkok, the energy sub-index dropped nearly 2% as oil fell nearly 2% on Monday, extending the previous session's steep decline, after poor U.S. job data and amid concern about Europe's debt woes.

The country's biggest energy firm, PTT, fell 2%, its exploration flagship PTT Exploration and Production lost 2.7% and the largest refiner, Thai Oil, was down 1.7%.

Foreign investors sold Thai shares worth a net 874 million baht (US$26.83 million) during the session, exchange data showed. - Agencies




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