However, a pick-up in telecommunications and media, healthcare and consumer products and services helped to stem the bleeding in the shortened trading week to April 20.
In its fund flow report for the week, MIDF Research said foreign investors sold RM22.82 million worth of shares on Tuesday, RM93.57 million on Wednesday and RM68.83 million on Thursday. The market was closed on Friday for the Hari Raya Aidilfitri holiday.
Monday was the only day when the foreign funds bought more than they sold. Of the RM34.11 million they invested that day, RM12.1 million went to RHB Bank, RM8.1 million to Pentamaster and RM7 million to Fraser & Neave.
During the week, financial services saw an outflow of RM139.5 million, technology saw a RM44.8 million outflow and utilities saw a RM15.7 million outflow.
Among the sectors that saw net foreign inflows last week were telecommunications and media (RM44.4 million), healthcare (RM18.4 million) and consumer products and services (RM9.7 million).
“Year-to-date, foreigners have net sold Malaysian equities for 10 out of 16 weeks, for a total of RM1.93 billion,” MIDF said.
Meanwhile, local institutional investors also turned net sellers last week. They sold RM7.3 million worth of equities to reverse two weeks of net inflows.
“They net sold RM25.72 million on Monday and RM25.63 million on Tuesday, but net bought RM30.08 million on Wednesday and RM14.02 million on Thursday,” the research house said.
Year-to-date, they have been net buyers for 11 out of 16 weeks with a total of RM1.82 billion.
In the meantime, local retailers were the top net buyers of the week at RM158.3 million, reversing a net selling trend for three consecutive weeks.
“The amount was the largest since the week ended Feb 10. They have net bought for eight out of 16 weeks this year, with a total of RM108.14 million,” MIDF said.
In terms of participation, there was an increase in average daily trading volume (ADTV) among local retailers by 6.5%, while among local institutions and foreign investors, there were declines of 4.4% and 7.6%, respectively.