Stocks Recover After Sell-Off
May 17, 2011
The key index, which tracks 100 blue-chip shares, gained 12.10 to 1105.42. It recovered just about all of the 12.88 points it lost Tuesday. Advancers led decliners 543 to 57, with 101 shares closing unchanged and 64 untraded. Volume was low, with just 181.0 million shares, worth 1.39 billion ringgit, changing hands. That was down sharply from the 221.0 million shares, valued at 1.85 billion ringgit, traded Tuesday. Traders said investors were a bit worried when the U.S. launched its second strike on Iraq after the market opened Wednesday, but said earlier fears about the attack escalating into a major conflict are now over. Therefore, they noted, investors came back into the market to pick up shares that were relatively better priced when compared with their levels on Monday. And that helped push the Emas Index, which tracks all main-board shares, 3.77 higher to 319.11. The Second Board Index, which tracks smaller shares, finished at 542.00 points, hitting a new all-time high about a week after posting its previous high. Investors have been buying heavily into second-board stocks for several weeks to push those shares to increasingly higher prices, bringing investors increasingly higher profits. Traders were keeping an eye on the shares of Malaysian Airline System, which spends a lot on gas, because of suspicion that the tension in Iraq could create fears about the oil supply in that region and therefore result in higher oil prices. But Malaysian Airline System, which owns Malaysia Airlines, was holding steady. Malaysia Airline System shares closed unchanged at 7.25 ringgit. Among the blue-chip shares that posted gains were DCB Holdings, adding 25 sen to 7.95 ringgit, and Malayan Banking, gaining 60 sen to 23.50 ringgit.
