KUALA LUMPUR (March 14): Bursa Malaysia extended Wednesday's losses to open lower on Thursday as profit-taking in selected heavyweights continued amid cautious sentiments in regional markets, a dealer said.

At 9.21am, the FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) slipped 1.87 points to 1,536.26 from Wednesday’s close of 1,538.13.

The benchmark index opened 2.53 points weaker at 1,535.60.

On the broader market, decliners led gainers at 242 to 216, while 347 counters were unchanged, 1,509 untraded and 26 suspended.

Turnover amounted to 740.285 million units worth RM215.68 million.

Malacca Securities said in a note that it expected the general tone on the local front to remain positive on Thursday amid bargain hunting activities in small cap stocks.

“The FBM KLCI ended softer (on Wednesday) after several index heavyweights exercised their dividends, while selected telecommunication heavyweights closed in negative territory.

“Given the weakness in the technology sector in the US, we believe the upside for technology stocks could be minimal on the local front. Meanwhile, we believe traders could focus on the commodities sector like the oil and gas and the plantation sector, with firmer performance from the underlying commodities overnight,” it said.

Among heavyweights, Maybank declined five sen to RM9.57, Public Bank fell two sen to RM4.20 and Tenaga Nasional fell two sen to RM11.52, while CIMB rose four sen to RM6.74 and Petronas Chemicals added one sen to RM6.82.

As for the actives, Hong Seng earned half-a-sen to two sen, Eversendai went up three sen to 42 sen, GDB Holdings perked 3.5 sen to 26.5 sen while Pan Malaysia was flat at 20 sen.

On the index board, the FBM Emas Index was 2.53 points weaker at 11,440.65, the FBMT 100 Index lost 5.19 points to 11,100.03 and the FBM ACE Index slipped 1.02 points to 4,705.40, while the FBM Emas Shariah Index advanced 1.48 points to 11,496.72 and the FBM 70 Index improved 26.76 points to 15,576.27.

Sector-wise, the Financial Services Index dropped 51.09 points to 17,184.48, the Plantation Index increased by 8.37 points to 7,283.57 and the Industrial Products and Services Index edged down 0.12 of a point to 175.57, while the Energy Index gained 5.99 points to 912.49.