KUALA LUMPUR (Jan 26): Bursa Malaysia extended Wednesday's (Jan 25) losses to end lower, weighed down by selling in selected heavyweights, led by the financial services sector, said a dealer.

At 5pm, the benchmark FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) eased 1.06 points to end at its intraday high of 1,498.39 from Wednesday’s closing of 1,499.45.

The market bellwether opened 2.04 points lower at 1,497.41 and hit a low of 1,494.03 during the mid-morning session.

However, on the broader market, gainers outpaced losers 565 to 359, while 431 counters were unchanged, 875 untraded and 37 others suspended.

Turnover rose to 3.75 billion units worth RM2.03 billion against Wednesday's 2.83 billion units worth RM1.68 billion.

Rakuten Trade Sdn Bhd vice-president of equity research Thong Pak Leng told Bernama that the FBM KLCI continued to decline despite the strong regional performance.

Nonetheless, gainers outnumbered losers, indicating some positive sentiment on the broad market, he noted.

"Bursa Malaysia bucked the regional trend whereby key regional indices trended mostly higher with strong gains in Hong Kong while China's market remained closed until next week.

"We believe the selling in the last two days provides a good opportunity for bargain hunting due to prevailing low valuations. The FBM KLCI is expected to hover within the 1,490 to 1,500 range towards the weekend," he added.

Regionally, Hong Kong's Hang Seng Index rose 2.37% to 22,566.78, South Korea’s Kospi increased 1.65% to 2,468.65 and Singapore's Straits Times Index added 0.76% to 3,378.31, while Japan’s Nikkei 225 slid 0.12% to 27,362.75.

Back home, Bursa heavyweights Malayan Banking Bhd shed three sen to RM8.78, Public Bank Bhd eased one sen to RM4.28, CIMB Group Holdings Bhd fell six sen to RM5.72, Petronas Chemicals Group Bhd edged up one sen to RM8.51, while Tenaga Nasional Bhd was flat at RM9.52.

As for the actives, ATA IMS Bhd rose 10 sen to 39.5 sen, Velesto Energy Bhd edged up half-a-sen to 22.5 sen, Cypark Resources Bhd bagged 12 sen to 96 sen, while Sapura Energy Bhd was flat at five sen, and Dataprep Holdings Bhd was unchanged at 26.5 sen.

On the index board, the FBM Emas Index added 12.12 points to 10,880.92, the FBM Emas Shariah Index increased 37.17 points to 11,149.13 and the FBM 70 Index rose 60.6 points to 13,679.47.

The FBMT 100 Index perked up 5.06 points to 10,554.1 and the FBM ACE Index advanced 59.49 points to 5,687.59.  

Sector-wise, the Energy Index improved 0.21 of-a-point to 870.64, the Plantation Index increased 24.65 points to 6,843.61, and the Industrial Products and Services Index inched up 0.7 of-a-point to 190.55, while the Financial Services Index fell 38.23 points to 16,503.79.  

The Main Market volume increased to 2.37 billion shares worth RM1.62 billion compared with Wednesday’s 1.98 billion shares worth RM1.31 billion.

Warrants turnover surged to 410.29 million units worth RM59.9 million from 122.24 million units worth RM12.97 million previously.

The ACE Market volume expanded to 969.87 million shares worth RM344.36 million from 732.49 million shares worth RM352.26 million on Wednesday.

Consumer products and services counters accounted for 360.01 million shares traded on the Main Market, industrial products and services (840.44 million), construction (98.53 million), technology (291.51 million), SPAC (nil), financial services (49.95 million), property (147.77 million), plantation (33.51 million), REITs (12.44 million), closed/fund (8,900), energy (351.08 million), healthcare (92.14 million), telecommunications and media (31.71 million), transportation and logistics (47.67 million), and utilities (14.01 million).