No Relief Yet For Malaysia Stock Market

The Malaysia stock market has finished lower in seven straight sessions, sinking more than 70 points or 4.9 percent along the way. The Kuala Lumpur Composite Index now rests just beneath the 1,495-point plateau and it’s tipped to open in the red again on Monday.

The global forecast for the Asian markets is sharply negative on growing interest rate and inflation concerns. The European and U.S. markets took heavy damage and the Asian bourses are tipped to open in similar fashion.

The KLCI finished sharply lower on Friday following losses from the financial shares, plantation stocks and telecoms.

For the day, the index dropped 15.76 points or 1.04 percent to finish at 1,493.95 after trading between 1,493.32 and 1,505.68. Volume was 2.262 billion shares worth 1.693 billion ringgit. There were 667 decliners and 254 gainers.

Among the actives, Axiata declined 1.66 percent, while CIMB Group slid 0.59 percent, Dialog Group tumbled 2.69 percent, Digi.com tumbled 1.86 percent, Genting plunged 6.54 percent, Genting Malaysia weakened 1.33 percent, Hartalega Holdings tanked 4.00 percent, IHH Healthcare advanced 0.78 percent, INARI slumped 1.45 percent, IOI Corporation shed 0.73 percent, Kuala Lumpur Kepong lost 0.64 percent, Maybank dipped 0.57 percent, Maxis and Public Bank both sank 0.88 percent, MISC rose 0.28 percent, MRDIY skidded 1.23 percent, Petronas Chemicals added 0.62 percent, PPB Group perked 0.25 percent, Press Metal fell 0.60 percent, RHB Capital eased 0.17 percent, Sime Darby surrendered 2.22 percent, Sime Darby Plantations stumbled 1.49 percent, Telekom Malaysia dropped 1.17 percent, Tenaga Nasional retreated 1.48 percent and Top Glove plummeted 7.38 percent.

The lead from Wall Street is broadly negative as the major averages opened sharply lower on Friday and remained that way throughout the session, ending with heavy losses.

The Dow plummeted 880.00 points or 2.73 percent to finish at 31,392.79, while the NASDAQ plunged 414.20 points or 3.52 percent to close at 11,340.02 and the S&P 500 tumbled 116.96 points or 2.91 percent to end at 3,900.86.

For the week, the Dow plunged 4.6 percent, the NASDAQ tanked 5.6 percent and the S&P 500 sank 5.1 percent.

The sell-off on Wall Street came after the Labor Department released a report showing consumer prices in the U.S. shot up by more than expected in the month of May, raising concerns about the outlook for interest rates.

The inflation spike is likely to convince the Federal Reserve to follow through on its plans to aggressively raise interest rates in an effort to combat inflation. The Fed will announce its latest monetary policy decision on Wednesday, with the central bank widely expected to raise interest rates by another 50 basis points.

Crude oil prices fell on Friday as the dollar surged higher after data showing a steep acceleration in U.S. inflation raised fears of more aggressive rate hikes by the Federal Reserve. West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures for July ended lower by $0.84 or 0.7 percent at $120.67 a barrel.