Bursa extends gains amid economic recovery hopes

KUALA LUMPUR (March 16): Bursa Malaysia extended its upward trend today, buoyed by hopes that the roll-out of Covid-19 vaccines will spur an economic recovery soon.

At 9.05am, the benchmark FBM KLCI had risen 3.33 points to 1,624.25 versus yesterday’s close at 1,620.92.

The index opened 2.88 points higher at 1,623.80.

On the broader market, gainers led losers 317 to 195, while 345 counters were unchanged, 1,358 untraded and nine others suspended.

Total volume stood at 560.06 million units valued at RM275.18 million.

Malacca Securities said with the arrival of another batch of Pfizer-BioNTech and Sinovac vaccines, it believes the key index should be trending higher amid expectations of a brighter economic outlook, as well as firmer crude palm oil (CPO) and oil prices.

Science, Technology and Innovation Minister Khairy Jamaluddin said Malaysia received 100,000 doses of the Sinovac vaccine and 83,070 doses of Pfizer-BionTech yesterday.

Pfizer will send another 124,020 doses and 125,190 doses on March 22 and 29 respectively.

Khairy said 100,000 doses of Sinovac will also arrive on March 22.

Malacca Securities believes traders may continue to put recovery-themed stocks on the radar amid the arrival of more vaccine batches this month.

“Meanwhile, technology stocks may rebound mildly, tracking the Nasdaq’s overnight gains.

“Besides, plantation proxies, such as the process equipment and fertiliser segment, may gain traction amid firmer CPO prices,” it said in a note.

Wall Street recovered from intraday losses as the Dow (+0.5%) recorded its seventh day winning streak on increasing optimism about the economic recovery and vaccine roll-out progress.

The US Federal Open Market Committee (FOMC) will kick off its two-day meeting today, with expectations that the central bank will revise its economy forecast following the US$1.9 trillion (RM7.82 trillion) fiscal stimulus aid.

Domestically, heavyweights Tenaga Nasional Bhd (TNB) had risen 10 sen to RM10.76, while CIMB Group Holdings Bhd and Petronas Chemicals Group Bhd (PetChem) gained half a sen to RM4.58 and RM8.30 respectively.

RHB Bank Bhd added eight sen to RM5.55 and Top Glove Corp Bhd was two sen higher at RM5.20.

In contrast, Hong Leong Bank Bhd (HLB) went down 42 sen to RM18.80 after yesterday’s gains and Nestle (Malaysia) Bhd dropped 90 sen to RM136.20.

Newly-listed this morning, Teladan Setia Group Bhd topped the active counters, increasing 10.5 sen to 58.5 sen, with more than 78 million shares traded.

Widad Group Bhd inched up four sen to 72 sen and Komarkcorp Bhd was 3.5 sen better at 38 sen.

On the index board, the FBM Emas Index went up 21.66 points to 11,906.47, the FBMT 100 was 20.66 points higher at 11,581.96 and the FBM Emas Shariah picked up 26.89 points to 13,156.52.

The FBM 70 rose 16.01 points to 15,640.54 and the FBM ACE surged 90.08 points to 10,716.22.

Sector-wise, the Financial Services Index declined 3.11 points to 15,642.87, while the Plantation Index improved 26.64 points to 7,182.53 and the Industrial Products and Services Index edged up 0.61 of a point to 193.05.

Source: TheEdgeMarkets