KLCI in the red, Asian markets fall after weak Wall St close

KUALA LUMPUR: Blue chips fell in early Wednesday trade on extended selling pressure, in line with cautious key Asian markets after the weak Wall Street close.

With Malaysian corporate earnings growing between 3% and 6% this year and the US-China trade tensions and other geopolitical worries, investors are not keen to put more money into riskier assets.

At 9.15am, the FBM KLCI was down 2.66 points or 0.16% to 1,685.02. Turnover was 294.85 million shares valued at RM115.58mil. There were 132 gainers, 144 losers and 195 counters unchanged.

Asian shares got off to a cautious start, holding close to six-month highs on hopes the US Federal Reserve will stick to a dovish stance and unveil a plan to stop cutting bond holdings later this year, Reuters reported.

MSCI’s broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan ticked down 0.1% from a six-month high touched the previous day. Japan’s Nikkei was also down 0.1%.

At Bursa, Nestle fell 20 sen to RM147.60, HL Bank 14 sen to RM20.62 while PPB Group and Tenaga lost 10 sen each to RM18.22 and RM13.10 while Petronas Chemical gave up seven sen to RM9.18.

Petronas Gas fell six sen to RM17.64, MAHB six sen also yo RM17.64, IOI Corp and Hartalega five sen each to RM4.50 and RM4.70.

RedTone rose seven sen to 33 sen in active trade.

Axiata rose nine sen to RM4.28 and IHH six sen to RM5.90 in very thin trade, Scientex added five sen to RM8.51 and MyNews five sen to RM1.38.

Source : TheStar