Bursa Malaysia jumps on tariffs exemptions for electronics

KUALA LUMPUR: Domestic equities prices shot up on Monday following the weekend announcement that the US was allowing tariff exemptions on smartphones and electronics.

The move suggested the Trump administration was finding ways to ease the downwards pressure of tariffs on the US economy and bond prices, raising investor sentiment and sending global equities prices higher.

At 9am, the FBM KLCI was 19.29 points higher from last Friday’s close to 1,474.05.

The benchmark has retraced more than half of the losses or about 74 points since the tariffs rout began on April 3 to descend to a low of 1,400 points on April 9.

“We can expect another volatile day ahead. Nonetheless, this is good for the market’s trading velocity, which improved recently,” it said in a note.

“We expect the index to trend between the 1,440-1,460 range today.”

In its technical view, TA Securities said the short-term technical momentum and trend indicators on the FBM KLCI are mixed following the volatile trading over the previous week.

It predicted choppy trade to persist this week as investors repond to the tit-for-tat tariff escalations between the US and China, and await greater clarity on the direction of global trade policy.

“However, medium-term momentum indicators on the local benchmark index suggest blue chips are poised for rebound after falling to very oversold levels.

“Meanwhile, the recent 90-day negotiation period for reciprocal tariffs offered by the Trump administration to our country should also lift local market sentiment going forward,” it added.

On Bursa Malaysia, the leading actives were Nationgate rising seven sen to RM1.30, Inari Amertron jumping 17 sne ot RM1.83 and MYEG gaining 1.5 sen to 91.5 sen.