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Indeed, Ringgit appreciation does affect the CPO negatively, nevertheless, KLK, Sime, PPB Oil and IOI don't contribute a huge chunk to the KLCI. KLK is a laggard of plantations stocks compared to IOI and PPB and I'm pretty bullish with the company. PPB has been aggresively expanding into Indonesia. Last but not least, IOI has rich valuations with good dividend payout. These are fundamentally strong companies. Both Malaysia and Indonesia are largest exporter of palm oil. The ringgit might have appreciated a fair bit but if you do track the rupiah, it has appreciated at least 8% since this year. That's far more than the ringgit.

Also, Bank Negara will definitely intervene on the Ringgit to and extent it is manageable for all parties. Also, due to the relaxation of certain currency control rules of the Yuan has directly appreciated the Ringgit.

Finally, with all the hype of biodiesel taking off next year, basically, these plantation stocks will have minimal effect towards the KLCI.

TNB, Telekom, Proton and even MAS are all under the GLC restructuring which we won't be seeing much result as at this year. Nevertheless, I sincerely applaud the move of publishing the KPIs (eventhough i think those should be their conservative figures) At least they are moving a step forward on transparencyt. During the Invest Malaysia forum, these leaders spoke of their companies problems, how they are going to manage them and they are very determine.

Malaysia was the worse performing bourse last year. We still are this year. However, we will be seeing short selling of shares being reintroduced, new indicies and single stock futures. These are all to promote liquidity. One main reason why foreign funds avoid our market was mainly due to liquidity. We do have some very strong stocks with good fundamentals. Foreigners love Genting, YTL, MISC, BST, our Plantation Stocks, Bursa (i think Bursa is very underweight =p) and many more. However, it is liquidity which made them shy away from our market. I do think it is possible to hit at least above 960 again this year if given the current volume traded on our market continues and current sentiment prevailing with no huge issues of SARS, avian flu and etc.

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Quite agree with the Silveru's statement about plantation stock issue but the plantation stocks actually affect the index around 10+%, not so big or not so small. The major beneficiers of the ringgit appreciation are those with huge foreign currency debt company especially TNB and TM.

On the other hand, I am a bit neutral about the restructuring of GLCs and not so optimistic especially regarding proton and mas. Another important point that foreigners avoid Malaysian market is partly due to the effect of financial control since 1998.

That's only my point of view, whether the restructuring of GLCs is successful or not, only time will tell. There is a thing even a top CEO can't do about it ->political influence.

yeah.. i wonder whether if they still in can improve or not..

looks like deutsche bank is the one responsible for iris and mobif's recent price hike

With annoucement of BNM's foreign currency reserves recently (31 Mac)clearly shows that there is minimal foreign interest on Malaysia market.

May be the market is waiting some real event of restructuring of GLCs to happen, until now, every GLCs said want to restructure but still yet to materialise. Although the massive restructuring exercise requires lot of planning and details to be iron up, they must at least give some clear signal and direction to the company. A lot of promise but result is the most important aspect to drive the market.

I feel the market activity is still a bit too early to judge. I'm still cautious. Bull yet? Next week will tell. Right now, my judgement is to keep the blues. Iris is making my heart beat too fast. And with busy activity, I have the impression that my broker's sidelining me....probably got few bigger player client. Anyone knows of broker taking a lesser cut that 0.4% in KL?

They r actively buying and selling but I think they r just acting on instruction for someone.

Sometimes they are just nominee acting on behalf of its client, which is quite common practice so that the real person involved won't be known.

woo...cpo went up by 24 points today

Yup! Agree with you cherroy on the capital control part. Once bitten twice shy. If the local government could somehow give some assurance that something like this wouldn't happen anymore then the foreigners could perhaps be more confident. Well, that does take some time but I do know in the futures market, there is a substantial participation by foreign brokerage. Well, not a lot compared to financially developed countries like Singapore and Hong Kong.

As for the GLC, all we can do is wait for the results. Despite giving false hopes many times, its rather unfair to give them a judgment now. If Proton does come out with a strategic alliance, then it'd be a shorter route for its revamption. As for MAS, Idris Jala has been rolling out many ways to improve overall service and really look in depth into the main issues of MAS. But once again, the airline industry is one of the more fragile industry so in the end, we can just wait and see.

Yeah... Its been like 6 weeks + since I've seen the FCPO fly. Some pretty good export data released. Friendlier MPOB data as well. Any positions Mobiusone???

0.4% ? where did you get 0.4% ?

The FMG5 and FKB3 dropped quite a lot today...guess everyone expecting an interest hike...

yep...i'm in a long position

ran into my stop loss during the morning trading session,then reenter it again during the 2nd trading session when it started to run.

phew...managed to offset my position and back to the previous lower one

Another problem to lure foreign investors is that policy and regulations are not consistent throughout which I don't think anyone would disagree on this one even listing and trading regulation is keep on changing. You needs some consistency to build the market confident over times.
Now they said short-sell is permitted but after market plunged may be short-sell will be prohibited again.

anyone try ameritrade b4?

well...the short sell system is pretty much useless to small traders like us

I think the lowest you could get is 0.42%.This is for internet trading and must be collateralised.No service or advice.

Day trade is 0.15%.similarly must be collateralised.

0.42% applies to all e-trade systems?