Kuala lumpur: Bursa Malaysia remained on an upward trajectory at mid-afternoon, driven by continued buying in selected heavyweights, particularly in the financial services and utilities sectors. At 3 pm, the FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) increased by 5.85 points to reach 1,707.53, an improvement from the previous day's closing of 1,701.68, even though the benchmark index opened 1.58 points lower at 1,700.10.

According to BERNAMA News Agency, market breadth was positive, with 492 gainers outpacing 463 losers. A total of 487 counters remained unchanged, while 1,224 were untraded and 10 were suspended. The turnover was recorded at 1.71 billion units, valued at RM1.40 billion.

Among the notable heavyweights, Maybank saw an increase of 14 sen to RM11.80, Public Bank rose by three sen to RM4.78, CIMB Group gained 15 sen to reach RM8.0, and Tenaga Nasional increased by two sen to RM14.16. Meanwhile, IHH Healthcare experienced a slight dip, easing one sen to RM9.0.

In terms of active stocks, AirAsia X fell by six sen to RM1.23, Zetrix AI decreased by one sen to 77.5 sen, and Capital A shed two sen to close at 43 sen. GDB Holdings and TWL Holdings remained unchanged at 37 sen and 2.5 sen, respectively.

Petronas Dagangan led the top gainers with a rise of 40 sen to RM21.90, followed by Hong Leong Financial Group, which gained 26 sen to RM20.86. Fraser and Neave Holdings also rose by 26 sen to RM32.12, United Plantations advanced 22 sen to RM31.48, and UMS Integration surged by 21 sen to RM4.72.

Conversely, among the top losers, Nestle dropped RM2 to RM102, Malaysian Pacific Industries decreased by 52 sen to RM30.02, Petronas Gas declined by 10 sen to RM17.50, QL Resources lost nine sen to RM3.93, and Mulpha International fell by 11 sen to RM2.75.

On the index board, the FBM Top 100 Index climbed 52.62 points to 12,323.21, the FBM Emas Index increased by 51.61 points to 12,479.41, and the FBM 70 Index jumped 120.33 points to 17,185.03. The FBM Emas Shariah Index was up by 45.83 points to 12,147.48, while the FBM ACE Index saw a slight decrease of 0.69 of-a-point to 4,358.53.

In sectoral performance, the Financial Services Index gained 121.52 points to 20,798.58, the Energy Index rose by 7.26 points to 788.81, the Plantation Index added 14.89 points to 8,382.38, and the Industrial Products and Services Index edged up by 0.40 of-a-point to 172.48.