Bursa Malaysia opened slightly lower today following continued concerns over Covid-19 and Wall Street's dismal overnight performance.
At 9.10am, the FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) declined slightly by 0.28 points to 1,607.45 while glove stocks recorded more limited returns.
Bernama reported that, at the opening, the key indicator index declined 0.45 points to 1,607.28.
Market sentiment as a whole was also slightly affected with losers outpacing gainers by 232 to 222 while 344 other counters were unchanged, 1,395 untraded and 17 others suspended.
Turnover stood at 578.44 million shares worth RM340.86.
Meanwhile, Malacca Securities said that while investors may focus on stocks with the prospect of higher returns, the market remained worried due to the increase in cases of the virus as well as the weak performance of the US stock market.
In fact, the stocks were lower when the Dow Jones Index fell 0.9% after US President Joe Biden suggested that the return on capital tax be doubled for those earning US $ 1 million and above.
Reports say Biden is expected to announce the proposal next week as part of an effort to cover the country's expenses.
At the local level, the price of crude palm oil (CPO) proved to be stronger and approached RM4,000 per tonne while Brent crude oil is also expected to record higher prices.
In addition, the performance of the timber trade was also reported to improve.
"We are confident that stocks related to plantations, oil and gas, timber will get attention. The transportation and logistics industry is expected to rebound after experiencing a modest decline in trade yesterday, "the brokerage firm said in a note today.
Top Glove and Hartalega continued to lead heavyweights as they rose six sen each to RM5.68 and RM10.60 respectively while Supermax gained 12 sen to RM5.89.
TM gained three sen to RM5.81 while Press Metal gained four sen to RM5.25.
On the other hand, Sime Darby lost two sen to RM2.27, IHH lost five sen to RM5.45, CIMB was three sen lower to RM4.21 and Public Bank lost one sen to RM4.19.
For active stocks, Mah Sing rose 11 sen to RM1.05, Focus Dynamics gained one sen to 12.5 sen, Bina Puri declined half -a -sen to 8.5 sen and Key Asic was flat at 19.5 sen.
On the index board, the FBM Gold Index declined 3.10 points to 11,831.76, the FBMT 100 declined 5.90 points to 11,486.80 and the FBM 70 declined 22.94 points to 15,607.42.
FBM Emas Shariah added 7.50 points to 13,279.79 while FBM ACE rose 52.08 points to 8,634.49.
By sector, the Plantation Index decreased 1.61 points to 6,854.50, the Financial Services Index declined 23.39 points to 15,024.03 and the Industrial Services and Products Index instead increased 0.26 points to 195.98.
