Malaysian share prices closed 0.84 percent higher on Tuesday in line with regional markets as investors bought into oil and gas related stocks, dealers said. A dealer from a local brokerage attributed gains to the strong performance on regional bourses as well as positive leads emerging from the domestic oil and gas sector over the past few weeks.
"The announcement by Kencana Petroleum that it has secured contracts for the Asia Petroleum Hub project further spurred interest in oil and gas stocks," he said. "This also can be regarded as rotational play with investors expecting more good news from the oil industry," he added.
The Kuala Lumpur Composite Index closed up 10.52 points at 1,256.82, off a high of 1,260.13 and trading volume was 1.81 billion shares, valued at 2.188 billion ringgit (644 million dollars). Gainers led losers 688 to 214.
At the close, the ringgit was quoted at 3.4605/4655 to the dollar. Meanwhile, SJ Securities head of research Cheah King Yoong said a possible alliance between Proton and Volkswagen could provide a further boost to the market.
Index heavyweights closed flat to lower, with Tenaga unchanged at 11.50 ringgit and Maybank at 12.60, while Telekom Malaysia was down 0.10 at 10.10. Proton fell 0.05 ringgit to 6.65.
Among oil and gas stocks, Dialog gained 0.23 ringgit to 1.78, Wah Seong advanced 0.26 to 3.06, SapuraCrest added 0.255 to 1.15 and Petra was up 0.16 rgt at 3.42. Kencana Petroleum was suspended from trading after announcing new contracts worth 240 million ringgit for the Asia Petroleum Hub project. Kencana was last traded at 1.35 ringgit, up 0.05 ringgit.