KL shares firmer at mid-day

MALAYSIAN sahres ended the morning session mostly higher today with sentiment buoyed by Wall Street's overnight rise, said a dealer.

The FTSE Bursa Malaysia Kuala Lumpur Composite Index (FBM KLCI) ended the session 3.5 points higher at 1,183.38. It had opened 2.01 points higher at1,181.89 this morning.

Dealers said interest was seen largely in plantation stocks on expectations of higher revenue due to the recovery in global demand of crude palm oil (CPO). The price of the commodity is also higher, tracking the crude oil price which touched a new high for the year to date, at US74 a barrel on Tuesday.

The Plantation Index increased 113.25 points to 5,788.14, followed by theFinance Index which went up 38.22 points to 9,660.51, but the Industrial Index slipped 1.4 points to 2,611.84.

The FBMEmas Index advanced 29.58 points to 7,994.57, the FBM Top 100 added22.43 points to 7,771.64 but the newly-introduced FTSE Bursa Malaysia ACE Index declined 2.09 points to 4,240.22.

Advancers outnumbered decliners by 342 to 209 while 198 counters were unchanged, 502 others untraded and 19 others suspended. Turnover stood at 462.516 million shares worth RM756.133 million.

US stocks edged higher on Tuesday led by the financial sector as economic data pointed to a sustained slow recovery from the recession, taking the Dow Jones Industrial Index and Standard & Poor''s 500 to a nine-month high.

The dealers said immediate resistance for the FBM KLCI should now be at the 1,187 point-level followed by 1,200-point psychological mark.

Among the volume leaders, Kannaltec inched down 1.5 sen to 14.5 sen, KNM Group added asen to 86.5 sen and IOI Corp jumped 22 sen to RM5.20.

Among the heavyweights, Sime Darby was flat at RM8.37, Maybank addedfour sen to RM6.82, and Bumiputera-Commerce lost five sen to RM8.11.