KUALA LUMPUR: Bursa Malaysia continued its uptrend on Tuesday, buoyed mainly by buying of hewavyweights such as Tenaga Nasional Bhd, Malayan Banking Bhd and Maxis Bhd. 

At 5pm, the benchmark FBM KLCI was up 7.38 points, or 0.44% to 1,691.00, against yesterday’s close of 1,683.62. The index opened 2.16 points to 1,685.78 this morning. The index moved between 1,694.55 and 1,684.06 in the morning session.

There were 440 gainers, 450 losers and 386 counters traded unchanged on the bursa Malaysia. Turnover was at 2.821 billion shares valued at RM2.568bil.

In today’s session, KLCI-component stocks were overwhelmingly in the positive, with 19 gainers, eight decliners and three counters unchanged.

Dealers said worries over weakening manufacturing activity and slowing economic growth hit market sentiment and dimmed enthusiasm around the Sino-U.S. trade truce.

Leading the gain on the index was Tenaga, advancing 26 sen to RM14.22, pushing the index up by 2.576 points. Maybank gained seven sen to RM8.98, contributing 1.371 points to the index while Maxis rose 10 sen to RM5.67, nudging the index up by 1.362 points. 

Laggards in the FBM KLCI component stocks included Petronas Chemicals, which fell nine sen to RM8.65, Sime Darby Plantations shed six sen to RM4.84 and Top Glove declined 12 sen to RM4.81.

Meanwhile, the ringgit was quoted at 4.1388, down 0.10% against the US dollar. 

Brent crude was last traded at US$64.93 per barrel while US crude traded at US$58.93 per barrel.

Among the key regional markets:

Japan’s Nikkei 225 added 0.11% to 21,754.27;

Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index advanced 1.17% to 28,875.56;

CSI 300 rose 0.03% to 3,937.17;

Taiwan’s Taiex fell 0.28% to 10,865.12;

South Korea’s Kospi declined 0.36% to 2,122.02 and

Singapore’s Straits Times Index shed 0.04% to 3,370.80.