KL shares open firmer in early tade

KUALA LUMPUR: Share prices on Bursa Malaysia opened firmer in early
session today lifted by gains in selected bluechips especially in
finance counters, dealers said.

After 15 minutes of trading,
the benchmark FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) was up 2.57 points to
1,632.02, after opening 0.63 of a point lower at 1,628.82, with heavy
participation by local institutions.

HwangDBS Vickers Research
said the liquidity-driven market would probably carry on and push the
benchmark FBM KLCI to challenge its immediate resistance threshold of
1,635.

It added this comes as US stock indices performned
slightly better and ended with a mixed performance, between flat and
-0.5 per cent overnight.

"Essentially, sentiment was clouded
by a jittery economic outlook amid hopes that the US Federal Reserve
would take additional stimulus initiatives," it said in a note today.

The
Finance Index gained 8.141 points to 14,616.99, the Plantation Index
inched down 1.061 points to 8,915.55 but the Industrial Index earned
2.91 points to 2,871.18.

The FBM Emas Index rose 18.59 points
to 11,175.54, while the FBM Mid 70 index was 33.409 points higher at
12,343.39, the FBMT 100 jumped 19.71 points to 10,994.28 but the FBM
ACE Index shed 21.73 points to 4,422.88.

Gainers led losers 139 to 74 while 148 counters were unchanged with 71.056 million lots worth RM48.816 million transacted.

Among
active counters, Harvest Court Industries earned three sen to 57.5 sen,
Naim Indah added one sen to 33.5 sen and Metronic Global was flat at
7.5 sen.

Of the heavyweights, Maybank and Sime Darby were up
three sen each to RM8.79 and RM9.98 respectively, CIMB inched up one
sen to RM7.87 while Petronas Chemicals fell one sen to RM6.55. - BERNAMA