KUALA LUMPUR (June 13): The FBM KLCI pared some of its loss at mid-morning today but remained pressured in line with stuttering regional markets.

At 10am, the FBM KLCI was down 6.73 points to 1,644.01. The index had earlier fallen to a low of 1,641.53.

Losers led gainers by 226 to 199, while 256 counters traded unchanged. Volume was 466.27 million shares valued at RM276.69 million.

The top losers included Fraser & Neave Holdings Bhd, Kuala Lumpur Kepong Bhd, Tenaga Nasional Bhd, Spritzer Bhd, Genting Plantations Bhd, Carlsberg Brewery Malaysia Bhd and Malaysia-listed Hang Seng Index-linked put warrants.

The actives included Greatech Technology Bhd, Iskandar Waterfront City Bhd, Ekovest Bhd, Sapura Energy Bhd, HPMT Holdings Bhd and Talam Transform Bhd.

The gainers included Nestle (M) Bhd, Lafarge Malaysia Bhd, Petronas Dagangan Bhd, Tasek Corp Bhd, Hong Leong Financial Group Bhd, Pharmaniaga Bhd, Hume Industries Bhd, Greatech and SAM Engineering & Equipment (M) Bhd.

Asian stocks stuttered on Thursday, dogged by the uncertainty over an intractable US-China trade dispute, while oil prices flirted with five-month lows, thanks to higher US crude inventories and a bleaker demand outlook, according to Reuters.

MSCI's broadest index of Asia-Pacific shares outside Japan ticked down 0.1%, slipping from a one-month high touched earlier this week, while Japan's Nikkei lost 0.3%, it said.

Hong Leong IB Research said that in the US, Wall Street could trend sideways over the near term as US President Donald Trump commented that he would impose more tariffs on Chinese goods (which may lead to full blown trade war) if there is no progress in the trade discussions with China President Xi Jinping in the upcoming G20 meeting later this month.

"Hence, investors could be worried that the trade war could prolong and could hurt the global economy moving forward.

"Taking cues from Wall Street and the unresolved trade tensions between the US and China, we opine that the stocks on the local bourse may take a breather as some of the stocks have rebounded fairly decent over the past few days.

"Nevertheless, we believe some trading activities will be noticed amongst construction and e-government services stocks, while O&G (oil and gas) stocks may rebound higher as Brent crude oil prices managed to stabilise near the US$60 level," it said.