KUALA LUMPUR (July 22): The FBM KLCI closed higher today, tracking regional bourses, which were mostly higher, as market sentiment was spurred by the overnight gain on Wall Street that was driven by strong quarter earnings figures so far.

The benchmark index increased 0.73% or 11.1 points to close at the intraday high of 1,527.62.

Elsewhere, Singapore’s Strait Times Index gained 1.28% to 3,159.08; Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index shot up 1.83% to 27,723.84, Seoul's Kospi index climbed 1.07% to 3,250.21; Tokyo's Nikkei 225 went up 0.58% to 27,548; the Shanghai Composite index rise 0.34% to 3,574.73. 

Malacca Securities Sdn Bhd senior analyst Kenneth Leong said the KLCI movement today is tracking gains on Wall Street last night, and is in line with regional gains.

“The gains today were driven by mild bargain-hunting activities. Investors are focusing on the economic recovery,” he told The Edge.

However, he expects the market to be range bound tomorrow, as the market recovery remains weak in the absence of catalysts to fuel buying interest.

Meanwhile, Hong Leong Investment Bank Research’s technical analyst Ng Jun Sheng said in a note today he remained optimistic that KLCI would eventually regain its upward momentum towards 1,534-1,556 levels (supports 1,490-1,500), supported by bottoming up technical indicators.

On stocks’ selection, he said the renewed weakness in ringgit may trigger some buying interests on export-oriented stocks in the technology, glove, wood-based, plantation and packaging industries.

Overall, market breadth was positive; 680 gainers outnumbered 320 losers and 418 counters were unchanged.

A total of 5.19 billion securities were traded at a value of RM2.98 billion, compared with 5.47 billion securities worth RM3.44 billion yesterday.

The top gainers were Genetec Technology Bhd (up RM1.12 or 6.36% to RM18.72), Kumpulan H & L High-Tech Bhd (up 89 sen or 22.03% to RM4.93), ViTrox Corp Bhd (up 82 sen or 4.89% to RM17.58).

Among the top losers were Rapid Synergy Bhd (down 40 sen or 4.82% to RM7.90), Hartalega Holdings Bhd (down 14 sen or 1.77% to RM7.75), SAM Engineering & Equipment (M) Bhd (down 12 sen or 1.66% to RM7.10).

Pasukhas Group Bhd, which saw 282.76 million shares change hands, was the most actively traded stock today.