At 9.07am, the FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) shaved 3.72 points to 1,493.96 from 1,497.68 at yesterday’s close.
The benchmark index opened 1.96 points easier at 1,495.72.
Market breadth was negative with losers outnumbering gainers 191 to 90, while 207 counters were unchanged, 1,797 not traded and eight others suspended.
Turnover stood at 130.47 million units worth RM53.29 million.
Rakuten Trade vice-president of equity research Thong Pak Leng noted that Wall Street closed broadly lower last night as sentiments remained jittery ahead of the release of the crucial US inflation data later today.
The DJI Average declined by 58 points, while the Nasdaq lost 150 points as the US 10-year yield inched higher to 2.78%.
On the local front, he said, the FBM KLCI returned to consolidation mode as the market undertone turned cautious.
“For today we reckon the index would trend within a tight range of 1,490 to 1,500 and we believe that there would be some selling pressure on technology stocks in view of the slump in US tech stocks overnight.
“Meanwhile, since there is a high chance that the US Federal Reserve would hike its rate by another 75 basis points (bps), we believe Bank Negara Malaysia may also look to readjust the overnight policy rate by another 25bps at least,” he told Bernama.
Among the heavyweights, Public Bank shed two sen to RM4.64, CIMB slipped a sen to RM5.28 and Tenaga trimmed four sen to RM8.40, while IHH Healthcare and Hong Leong Bank were flat at RM6.40 and RM20.88, respectively.
However, Maybank bagged two sen to RM8.91 and Petronas Chemicals added a sen to RM8.80.
Of the actives, G3 Global inched down half-a-sen to 3.5 sen, Bintai Kinden was flat at 9.5 sen, Top Glove slid half-a-sen to 98 sen, Dagang Nexchange and SFP were 1.5 sen lower at 87.5 sen and 92.5 sen, respectively, while Cypark gained 2.5 sen to 45 sen.
On the index board, the FBM Emas Index gave up 31.61 points to 10,590, the FBMT 100 Index fell 31.64 points to 10,339.51, the FBM Emas Shariah Index lost 46.03 points to 10,707.05, the FBM 70 erased 62.25 points to 12,639.86 and the FBM ACE contracted 15.66 points to 4,871.08.
Sector-wise, the financial services index shed 1.66 points to 16,685.49, the energy index slipped 1.28 points to 651.41, the industrial products and services index softened 0.29 of-a-point to 181.58 and the plantation index erased 20.4 points to 7,081.84.
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