Little Movement Expected For Malaysia Stock Market

(RTTNews) - The Malaysia stock market on Tuesday wrote a finish to the six-day losing streak in which it had stumbled more than 35 points or 2.3 percent. The Kuala Lumpur Composite Index now sits just above the 1,615-point plateau and it's likely to hold steady in that neighborhood again on Wednesday.

The global forecast for the Asian markets offers little clarity, although technology shares may provide a slight boost. The European markets were down and the U.S. bourses were mixed and the Asian markets figure to split the difference.

The KLCI finished slightly higher on Tuesday as the financial shares, plantation stocks, industrials and telecoms were mostly in the green.

For the day, the index rose 4.61 points or 0.29 percent to finish at 1,615.08 after trading between 1,609.70 and 1,619.05.

Among the actives, Axiata retreated 1.28 percent, while Celcomdigi and Maybank both collected 0.58 percent, CIMB Group jumped 0.87 percent, Genting Malaysia accelerated 1.33 percent, Hong Leong Bank tanked 2.01 percent, IHH Healthcare slumped 0.95 percent, IOI Corporation and RHB Bank both strengthened 0.79 percent, Kuala Lumpur Kepong and Sunway both added 0.46 percent, Maxis surged 4.97 percent, MISC gathered 0.27 percent, MRDIY tumbled 1.79 percent, Nestle Malaysia plunged 2.91 percent, Petronas Chemicals dipped 0.18 percent, Petronas Dagangan eased 0.11 percent, PPB Group declined 1.11 percent, Press Metal shed 0.42 percent, QL Resources rose 0.42 percent, Sime Darby soared 2.51 percent, Telekom Malaysia perked 0.15 percent, Tenaga Nasional gained 0.43 percent, YTL Corporation rallied 1.01 percent, YTL Power spiked 2.29 percent and Genting, SD Guthrie and Public Bank were unchanged.

The lead from Wall Street is murky as the major averages opened lower on Tuesday and largely hugged the line before ending mixed.

The Dow slumped 154.52 points or 0.36 percent to finish at 42,233.05, while the NASDAQ jumped 145.56 points or 0.78 percent to close at a record 18,712.75 and the S&P 500 rose 9.40 points or 0.16 percent to end at 5,832.92.

The climb by the NASDAQ came ahead of the release of earnings news from big-name tech companies, including with Google parent Alphabet (GOOGL), Advanced Micro Devices (AMD), Meta Platforms (META), Microsoft (MSFT), Amazon (AMZN) and Apple (AAPL).

Semiconductor stocks showed a particularly strong move to the upside, driving the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index up by 2.3 percent.

In U.S. economic news, the Conference Board noted a substantial improvement by U.S. consumer confidence in October. Also, the Labor Department said job openings in the U.S. fell to 7.44 million in September from a downwardly revised 7.86 million in August.

Oil futures settled lower again on Tuesday amid concerns crude supplies will far exceed near term demand. West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures for December ended down $0.17 or about 0.25 percent at $67.21 a barrel.