KUALA LUMPUR (June 24): Foreign funds snapped a two-week buying streak last week, and offloaded RM441.1 million of Malaysian equities, from an inflow of RM202.4 million the prior week.

In its weekly fund flow report on Monday, MIDF Research said foreign investors net sold every day in the shortened trading week, in conjunction with the Hari Raya Haji holiday last Monday.

“They net sold RM80.3 million on Tuesday, RM120.3 million on Wednesday, RM64.7 million on Thursday, and RM175.8 million on Friday.

“The sectors that recorded the highest net foreign inflows last week were industrial products and services (RM130.4 million), technology (RM65.3 million), and transportation and logistics (RM64.0 million), while the sectors with the highest net foreign outflows were financial services (RM529.9 million), healthcare (RM56.2 million), and plantation (RM36.4 million),” it said.

MIDF said local institutions returned to net buying last week, amounting to RM274 million, after two weeks of net selling.

It said they only net sold RM27.9 million on Thursday, while net buying RM57.5 million on Tuesday, RM66.9 million on Wednesday, and RM177.5 million on Friday.

“Similarly, local retailers also net bought last week at RM167.1 million, after net selling for two straight weeks.

“They only net sold RM1.7 million on Friday, and net bought for the rest of the week,” it said.

MIDF said that in terms of participation, there was an increase in the average daily trading volume at 36.1% among foreign investors, and declines of 18.1% among locla retailers and 11.1% among local institutional investors.

Commenting on the international situation, MIDF said last week, the majority of markets showed gains, with 14 out of 20 indices it tracks finishing in positive territory.

“Leading the gains were Taiwan’s TAIEX (3.33%), Indonesia’s JCI (2.16%), and France’s CAC 40 (1.67%).

“The Nasdaq remained unchanged. Conversely, the top decliners were the Philippines’ PSEi (3.53%), China’s Shenzhen CSI 300 (1.30%), and the FBM KLCI (1.05%),” it said.