KUALA LUMPUR (July 15): The FBM KLCI finished down at its intraday low today after falling 13.19 points or 0.83% to 1,585.56 while Bursa Malaysia small market capitalisation (small cap) index rose more than 1% as Covid-19 vaccine hopes spurred world stock markets.

Covid-19 vaccine hopes and profit-taking, however, appeared not to bode well today for shares of rubber glove manufacturers, which had earlier seen their stock prices increase substantially due to rising Covid-19 infections globally.

Across Bursa Malaysia today, 8.24 billion shares worth RM5.02 billion were traded. There were 558 gainers and 456 decliners.

The top four decliners were rubber glove manufacturers, led by Hartalega Holdings Bhd followed by Top Glove Corp Bhd, Supermax Corp Bhd and Kossan Rubber Industries Bhd.

Hartalega and Top Glove are KLCI constituents. Hartalega's share price closed RM1.40 or 8.24% lower at RM15.60 while Top Glove finished down RM1.36 or 5.87% at RM21.80.

Speaking to theedgemarkets.com today, Areca Capital Sdn Bhd chief executive officer Danny Wong Teck Meng said: “The KLCI is mainly down because of these two counters [Hartalega and Top Glove]."

"But most of the other sectors are positive and not really down,” he said.

Meanwhile, the most-active stocks across Bursa included Reservoir Link Energy Bhd, which debuted on the ACE Market today. Reservoir Link saw some 189 million shares traded when markets closed today.

Reservoir Link's share price closed up 10.5 sen or 25.61% at 51.5 sen against its initial public offering price of 41 sen apiece.

Globally, it was reported that Asian shares rose on Wednesday, led by coronavirus vaccine hopes though sentiment was cautious after Beijing vowed retaliatory sanctions against the US, while the euro rose to a four-month high ahead of a crucial EU summit.

"Overnight risk appetite was boosted by Moderna Inc's experimental vaccine for Covid-19 which showed it was safe and provoked immune responses in all 45 healthy volunteers in an early-stage study. On Tuesday, the Dow Jones Industrial Average rose over 2%, while the S&P 500 gained 1.34% and the Nasdaq Composite climbed 0.94%.

"Stocks firmed despite rising Sino-US tensions and three US states reporting new record daily deaths from the pandemic," Reuters reported.