KUALA LUMPUR (Feb 6): The FBM KLCI ended the short trading week 10.04 points or 0.56% higher to 1,813.25 today, as investors start taking position before the coming holiday period.

The benchmark index reached an intraday high of 1,814.3 points and a low of 1,806.1 points before settling at 1,813.25. Bursa Malaysia witnessed some 1.92 billion shares traded, with the total value of RM2.15 billion.

Areca Capital Sdn Bhd chief executive officer Danny Wong told theedgemarkets.com that the local bourse was “flattish” today and will likely remain so for the next week.

“There was no catalyst to give the market a push and investors are starting to take their positions before the Chinese New Year holidays,” he said.

“Retail investors are likely to stay on the sidelines (in the meantime) and short term traders will be looking to close their books before the holidays. Any movement in the market will likely come from institutional investors,” Wong added.

He said that KLCI has traditionally seen more buying than selling by institutional investors during this period.

“The recovery in global oil price is also positive for the market and it will be no surprise if institutional investors see this as the right time to take position,” he added.

Gainers outnumbered decliners by 512 to 291, still indicating a bullish sentiment among investors. There were 341 unchanged counters.

Among the top gainers were British American Tobacco (M) Bhd which rose 1.47%, Petronas Dagangang Bhd which gained 4.54% and Guiness Anchor Bhd which climbed 6.39%.

On the other hand, PPB Group Bhd lost 1.49%, VSolar Group Bhd declined 4.93% and Encorp Bhd shed 11.54% to occupy the decliners table.

Asia Bioenergy Technologies Bhd emerged as Bursa’s most actively traded stock again. The counter saw 102.9 million shares traded today to close at 18.5 sen, up 2 sen or 12.12%.

Regionally, South Korea’s Kospi and Hong Kong’s Hang Seng both rose 0.14% and 0.7% respectively while Japan’s Nikkei lost 0.15%.