KUALA LUMPUR: The FBM KLCI climbed more than 10 points in the morning session as fears over an economic slowdown in China were offset by optimism over corporate earnings results scheduled for release over the next two weeks.
At 12.30pm, the key index was up 10.58 points to 1,514.59.
Despite the bullish performance on the blue-chip index, the market breadth was slightly negative with 378 decliners compared with 362 gainers.
There was also a significant pick up in trading activity with volume rising to 1.57 billion shares valued at RM1.07bil.
Among the leading heavyweights, Tenaga Nasional jumped 13 sen to RM8.85.
Plantation stocks also rallied with Sime Darby Plantation
surging 14 sen to RM3.79, IOI gaining 10 sen to RM4.26 and Kuala Lumpur Kepong climbing 16 sen to RM22.48.
Meanwhile, heavy selling continued in glove maker Hartalega, which lost 19 sen to RM1.67. The stock was the most heavily traded in the morning session with 100.97 million shares exchanging hands.
Sector rival Top Glove was the second most-heavily traded counter on Bursa with 94.06 million shares crossed, but rose 3.5 sen to 83 sen.
Other leading actives included Borneo Oil unchanged at 2.5 sen and Metronic up 1.5 sen to six sen.
In Asian markets, investors were torn between negative economic data in China and the bullish sentiment in Wall Street.
While recessionary fears stalk global markets, investors are looking forward to a slower pace of interest rate hikes by the US Federal Reserve.
Japan’s Nikkei fell 0.1% to 28,858, South Korea’s Kospi rose 0.2% to 2,533 and China’s composite index gained 0.24% to 3,283.
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng rose 0.1% to 20,063 and Australia’s ASX200 climbed 0.5% to 7,100.