Local bourse edges higher at close

by **hlk** Mon 29 Aug 2011, 19:10

KUALA LUMPUR: The benchmark index was up 0.17% and closed at 1,447.27 on Monday with financial and energy-related stocks among the gainers.

Regional markets were mostly trading in positive territory except for Shanghai's A share index, which tumbled 1.25% to 2,584.40 at the 11.30am break.

At Bursa Malaysia, advancers outpaced decliners 432 to 214 while 221 other counters were traded unchanged in the shortened trading day. The local bourse would be closed for the Aidil Fitri holdidays and open again on Friday.

There were 447.13 million shares traded with a total turnover of RM893.57 million.

Among financial stocks, CIMB gained 3 sen to RM7.07, RHB Capital added 20 sen to RM8.30, Maybank added 5 sen to RM8.72 and Public Bank was 6 sen higher at RM13.06.

Petronas Chemicals rose 19 sen to RM6.22, MISC added 19 sen to RM6.97, Petronas Dagangan gained 16 sen to RM17.64, Petronas Gas fell 16 sen to RM13.22 and TNB was 1 sen higher at RM5.25.

Among consumer stocks, Nestle gained 80 sen to RM48.90, Carlsberg added 19 sen to RM6.87 while Dutch Lady lost 18 sen to RM18.70.

DiGi gained 20 sen to RM30.22 and Telekom was 1 sen lower at RM4.15. E&O, in which Sime Darby has proposed to acquire a 30% stake, was up 4 sen to RM1.49.

IOI Corp dropped 10 sen to RM4.51, United Plantations gained 18 sen to RM18.18 and Genting Plantations shed 13 sen to RM7.07.

Spot gold lost US$4.88 to US$1,822.27 per ounce.

Nymex crude oil gained 22 cents to US$85.59 per barrel.

Crude palm oil for November delivery added RM34 to RM3,009 per tonne.

The ringgit was quoted at 2.978 to the US dollar and 4.316 to the euro.