KUALA LUMPUR: Late fund buying of Genting Malaysia and Genting Bhd helped power the FBM KLCI into the positive zone on Friday while trading value exceeded the volume for the first time in many trading days.

At 5pm, the FBM KLCI was up 4.96 points or 0.28% to 1,786.33. Turnover was 2.15 billion shares valued at RM2.69bil. There were 379 gainers, 447 losers and 402 stocks unchanged.

Shanghai stocks fell on Friday to end the week lower, as a slew of soft data suggested the world's second-largest economy is starting to lose some momentum in the face of rising borrowing costs and government-mandated capacity cuts, Reuters reported.

The ringgit rose against the US dollar, up 0.39% to 4.1892. It climbed 0.08% to the euro to 4.9995. However, it slumped against the surging pound, down 2.2% to 5.6705 and shed 0.08% to the Singapore dollar at 3.1152.

Genting Malaysia rose 14 sen to RM5.82 and added 1.41 points to the KLCI while Genting Bhd gained 12 sen to RM9.85 and added 0.78 of a point.

Crude palm oil for third-month delivery was flat at RM2,867 per tonne. The government has raised October crude palm oil export tax to 6% from 5.5% in August to September

IOI Corp rose 12 sen to RM4.66 after the plantation heavyweight announced a payment of dividend  from part of the proceeds from the sale of its 70% stake in IOI Loders Croklaan for about RM4bil in cash. Some RM788.2mil will be set aside as cash dividend to shareholders (which translates into a dividend per share of 13 sen).

Sime Darby rose six sen to RM9.20, PPB Group gained four sen to RM16.76 but KL Kepong fel 10 sen to RM24.60.

Global markets weakened following North Korea's latest missile launch, but crude remained close to five-month highs reached this week on bullish demand forecasts and US refineries restarting. 

US light crude oil rose rose four cents to US$49.93 and Brent added six cents to US$55.53. Petronas Chemicals fell seven sen to RM7.33 and erased 0.95 of a point, Petronas Dagangan was down eight sen to RM24.22 and Petronas Gas two sen lower at RM18.58.

Astro rose eight sen to RM2.71 after posting a strong set of results.  Westports gained 10 sen to RM3.88.

As for telcos, Maxis shed three sen to RM5.76, Axiata and Digi were flat at RM5.09 and RM4.87 while Telekom gained six sen to RM6.41. Time dotCom added 30 sen to RM9.60.

Among the banks and finance stocks, HLFG added 14 sen to RM17.16, Hong Leong Bank gained eight sen to RM15.98, AmBank and RHB Bank three sen each to RM4.53 and RM5.10 while CIMB gained two sen to RM6.75.  Public Bank fell four sen to RM20.54 and Maybank shed two sen to RM9.70.

Lafarge added 18 sen to RM6.50 and Sunway 13 sen to RM4.57 but Cepco lost 17 sen to RM1.58.

However, Magni-Tech tumbled RM1.14 to RM6.16 after it posted a set of weaker earnings.  Scientex fell 63 sen to RM8.83. KESM lost 16 sen to RM15.38.

Among the key regional markets,

Japan’s Nikkei 225 rose 0.52% to 19,909.50;

Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index gained 0.11% to 27,807.59;

CSI 300 edge dup 0.04% to 3,831.30;

Shanghai’s Composite Index fell 0.53% to 3,353.62;

Hang Seng China Enterprise fell 0.3% to 11,067.55;

Taiwan’s Taiex gained 0.25% to 10,580.41;

South Korea’s Kospi added 0.35% to 2,386.07 and

Singapore’s Straits Times Index fell 0.35% to 3,209.56.

Spot gold skidded US$4.72 to US$1,325.02.