This article first appeared in The Edge Financial Daily on September 19, 2018

KUALA LUMPUR: Offshore investors returned to Bursa Malaysia during the holiday-shortened week ended Sept 14, said MIDF Amanah Investment Bank Bhd Research.

In his weekly fund flow report yesterday, MIDF Research’s Adam M Rahim said international funds bought a paltry RM2.6 million local equities last week, compared to the selldown of RM663.4 million the prior week.

He said the RM2.6 million was the smallest weekly foreign net inflow recorded so far this year.

On the regional front, Malaysia bucked the trend, being the only country to attract inflows last week among the four Asean markets he monitors, according to the report.

Adam said foreign net buying then inched higher to RM177.7 million net last Friday as investors tracked gains from Wall Street’s tech rally overnight, which pushed the S&P 500 Index to its fourth consecutive day of gains amid the release of Apple’s new products.

Adam said as of last Friday, the year-to-date outflow from Bursa stood at RM9.25 billion, approximately offsetting slightly more than 90% of the total foreign net inflow seen in 2017.

He said notwithstanding this, Malaysia still retains its position as the nation with the second-lowest foreign outflow among the four Asean markets he monitors.

“Despite the short week, the weekly average daily traded value (ADTV) among retail investors, local institutions and foreign investors increased. The ADTV of foreign investors rose the most during the week by 41.6% to RM1.6 billion, marking its 10th consecutive week of being above RM1 billion,” he said.

In Asia, Adam said the pace at which international funds were reducing their exposure substantially slowed down last week. “Based on the provisional aggregate data for the seven Asian exchanges that we track, investors classified as ‘foreign’ only sold US$338.4 million net last week.”