KUALA LUMPUR: Bursa Malaysia closed lower on Wednesday, in line with regional peers, following U.S. Federal Reserve chief’s remarks dashed investor expectations on imminent rate cut.

At closing, the 30-stock index stood at 1,678.49, down 2.12 points, or 0.13%. The local bourse opened 2.38 points lower at 1,674.23 this morning. 

Losers beat gainers led losers 395 to 305 with 447 counters unchanged. Turnover stood at 1.82 billion worth RM1.54bil.

The ringgit was down 0.05% against the US dollar at 4.1465. The local unit was quoted at 4.7121 against the euro, up 0.12%. The ringgit gained 0.59% against the pound at 5.2574 and declined 0.02% to 3.0624 against the Singapore dollar. 

Dealers said the comments from U.S. Federal Reserve dampened excitement about an aggressive rate cut as early as July from the world’s most important central bank. In addition, dealers said investors were caution ahead of the meeting between US and China. 

Top gainers on the stock exchange included Panasonic Manufacturing, rising 70 sen to 39.70, Dutch Lady gained 50 sen to RM64 and British American Tobacco added 44 sen to RM29.50. 

Declining stocks included Tenaga falling 22 sen to RM13.78, Heineken Malaysia dropping 20 sen to RM23.70 and Telekom Malaysia slipping 13 sen to RM4.02.

Sime Darby Plantations fell five sen to RM4.84, pushing the index down by 0.599 points, Press Metal shed seven sen to RM4.38, dragging the index down by 0.492 points and MISC declined six sen to RM7.15, nudging the index down by 0.466 points. 

Meanwhile, Asian market were trading mostly in red. China stocks ended slightly lower on Wednesday as financial stocks weighed on the market. The blue-chip CSI300 index fell 0.2%, to 3,794.33, while the Shanghai Composite Index shed 0.2% to 2,976.28.
 
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng index ended up 0.1% at 28,221.98 points, while the China Enterprises Index gained 0.2% to 10,766.06 points.

South Korea’s Kospi index closed up 0.20 points or 0.01% at 2,121.84 while Japan’s Nikkei 225 dropped 0.5% to 21,086.59.