KUALA LUMPUR (March 29): The FBM KLCI pared some of its gains at mid-morning today as decliners overtook advancers.

At 10am, the FBM KLCI was up 0.78 points at 1,858.65. The index had earlier risen to a high of 1,860.56.

Losers overtook gainers by 251 to 209, while 311 counters traded unchanged. Volume was 379.53 million shares valued at RM192.81 million.

The gainers included Heineken Malaysia Bhd, Panasonic Manufacturing Malaysia Bhd, KESM Industries Bhd, Aeon Credit Service (M) Bhd, MISC Bhd, Syarikat Takaful Malaysia Bhd, Nestle (M) Bhd, British American Tobacco (M) Bhd and Scientex Bhd.

The actives included Sapura Energy Bhd, D.B.E. Gurney Resources Bhd, Hibiscus Petroleum Bhd, Iris Corp Bhd and UMW Oil & Gas Corp Bhd.

The losers included SAM Engineering & Equipment (M) Bhd, Malaysian Pacific Industries Bhd, UMW Holdings Bhd, Ajinomoto (M) Bhd and Press Metal Aluminium Holdings Bhd.

Asian stocks edged up and the safe haven yen was broadly lower against the US dollar on Thursday amid perceived progress on North Korea issues, although equity gains were limited after a tech-led retreat on Wall Street, according to Reuters.

MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan was up 0.05%, it said.

Hong Leong IB Research in a traders' brief said Malaysia's stock market should see stabilising trading activities on KLCI ahead of potential 1Q window dressing activities.

"However, we remain cautious on small cap and ACE market as both the sub-indices may continue the trend lower amid weakening technical," it said.