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Bargain hunting on utility, banking stocks pushes Bursa Malaysia higher

KUALA LUMPUR: Bursa Malaysia closed slightly higher today as bargain hunting activities emerged following two days in negative territory with buying mainly on utilities and banks while selling on telco, analysts said.

Most key regional bourses closed higher and bond yields declined as investors balanced the cooling US inflation. 

At 5pm, the FBM KLCI rose 1.22 points to 1,610.17 against 1,608.95 on Wednesday's close.

The FBM KLCI, which opened 3.63 points higher at 1,612.58, moved between 1,609.13 and 1,616.84.

On market breadth gainers surpassed decliners by 798 to 447, while 453 counters were unchanged, 703 untraded and 15 others suspended.

Tech stocks remain the key focus for investors as excitement around AI has driven stocks to record highs despite concerns about high interest rates and a slowdown in the world's largest economy. 

"On the domestic front, we remain cautiously optimistic on the strong demand on tech, AI related and supporting industries. 

"Hence, we anticipate the benchmark index to trend with the range of 1,610-1,625 towards the weekend with immediate resistance at 1,620 and support at 1,610," said Thong.

Malacca Securities Sdn Bhd said even though the US Federal Reserve kept the interest rate unchanged and was looking at 1 rate cut in 2024, the market was expecting more rate cuts this year due to declining inflationary numbers. 

"Despite FBM Small Cap pulling back, and noticed several downward swings in the power distribution segments, we remain positive on the technology sector namely the HDD, cloud, cybersecurity segments driven by the solid investments for data centers in Malaysia by several multinational companies" it added.

The firm believes that traders will remain positive on Johor property players with the potential of land sale deals going forward. 

Other sectors that may benefit from this catalyst will be the construction, building material, utilities and RE sectors.

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