KUALA LUMPUR (June 15): The heavy foreign selling on Bursa does not seem to be abating, with foreign investors have now been net sellers on Bursa for seven consecutive weeks, according to MIDF Research. 

In his weekly fund flow report today, MIDF Research head Zulkifli Hamzah said that for the third week running, the amount offloaded was more than RM850 million a week. 

“It has been the longest undisrupted stretch of “intense” selling so far this year.

“Last week, investors classified as “foreign” sold equity listed in the open market on Bursa on a net basis amounting to RM852.7 million,” he said. 

Zulkifli said it was only a small let up from the RM926.1 million sold the week before.

He said that for the third week in a row, foreign investors were net sellers every single trading day of the week. 

“All in, they had been selling for the past 19 straight trading days. 

“As was the case in the preceding week, the amount exceeded the RM200 million mark on Tuesday and Thursday, making it 20 days so far this year that the amount had surpassed the threshold,” he said. 

Zulkifli said that in comparison, daily foreign sale exceeded RM200 million on 23 occasions in 2014.

He said that last week’s selldown increased the cumulative net foreign outflow in 2015 to RM7.5 billion, surpassing the RM6.9 billion outflow for the entire 2014. 

“We estimate that there is still an overhang of about RM15 billion-RM20 billion of foreign portfolio liquidity on Bursa. 

“Foreign shareholding on Bursa should be close to 23%,” he said. 

Zulkifli said that foreign participation (daily average gross purchase and sale) declined 16% to a moderate RM846m, the third lowest this year.

He explained that local institutions mopped up RM852.0 million last week but participation rate fell further to RM1.56 billion, the
lowest this year.

“Retailers were hardly in the market, with only RM700,000 change in net position. Participation rate of RM508 million was also the lowest this year,” he said.