Selective buying was also seen in several other sectors, with the plantation and industrial products and services indices swinging back to green.
At 5pm, the benchmark FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) ended at its intra-day high of 1,480.11, up 5.42 points from Tuesday’s closing of 1,474.69.
The market bellwether opened 1.14 points lower at 1,473.55 and touched an intra-day low of 1,461.18 today.
Market breadth, however, remained weak as losers outpaced gainers 564 to 367, while 387 counters were unchanged, 951 untraded, and 25 others suspended.
Turnover dipped to 2.65 billion units worth RM1.82 billion versus 3.06 billion units worth RM1.85 billion on Tuesday.
Rakuten Trade Sdn Bhd vice-president of equity research Thong Pak Leng said, looking at its movement pattern, the FBM KLCI could hit the 1,500 level this week.
“It seems that investors are in the year-end sales and shopping mood.
“But the broader market performance today mirrored the regional weakness and with some profit-taking activities,” he told Bernama.
Leading the gainers, heavyweight Maybank increased seven sen to RM8.71, followed by Axiata and TM, which rose 9 sen to RM3.10 and 19 sen to RM5.40, respectively.
Digi advanced six sen to RM3.98 and Petronas Gas climbed 32 sen to RM17.12.
Lagging heavyweights were IHH and RHB Bank, which eased five sen each to RM6.13 and RM5.60, while MISC lost six sen to RM7.29.
Of the actives, Top Glove shed 3 sen to 89.5 sen, Cypark Resources was 1.5 sen lower at 42.5 sen, while Global Oriental and Berjaya Corp shed half-a-sen each to 26 sen and 29 sen respectively.
On the index board, the FBM Emas Index put on 8.02 points to 10,618.90, the FBMT 100 Index went up 14.05 points to 10,335.68, the FBM Emas Shariah Index added 5.96 points to 10,850.38, while the FBM 70 Index slid 85.65 points to 13,010.23, and the FBM ACE Index shaved off 65.95 points to 5,287.70.
Sector-wise, the financial services index climbed 14.67 points to 16.369.04, the plantation index added 11.79 points to 7,000.22, the industrial products and services index rose 0.63 of-a-point to 180.90, but the energy index was 4.34 points lower at 783.61.
The Main Market volume dwindled to 1.6 billion shares worth RM1.5 billion against 2.01 billion shares worth RM1.47 billion on Tuesday.
Warrants turnover jumped to 397.96 million units valued at RM75.8 million versus 132.22 million units valued at RM14.27 million yesterday.
The ACE Market volume fell to 650.66 million shares worth RM245 million compared with 911.63 million shares worth RM363.78 million previously.
Consumer products and services counters accounted for 246.22 million shares traded on the Main Market, industrial products and services (476.62 million); construction (38.51 million); technology (181.88 million); SPAC (nil), financial services (78.29 million); property (137.15 million); plantation (43.12 million); REITs (4 million), closed/fund (100); energy (104.20 million); healthcare (194.74 million); telecommunications and media (23.28 million); transportation and logistics (53.76 million); and utilities (16.87 million).