KUALA LUMPUR, Feb 11 ― The local stock market's key index ended the day higher ahead of the Lunar New Year holiday, bucking the trend of losses in Asean peers such as the Philippines, Singapore and Thailand.

Meanwhile, markets in China, Japan, South Korea and Taiwan were all on holiday, contributing to the lack of liquidity.

At 12.30pm, the FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI (FBM KLCI) rose 2.57 points to 1,559.42 after moving between 1,594.52 and 1,602.50 during the half-day trading.

The index opened 5.34 points better at 1,602.19 compared with1,596.85 at yesterday’s close.

Market breadth turned positive with gainers outpacing losers 574 to 383, while 451 counters were unchanged, 740 untraded and 14 others suspended.

Volume stood at 3.21 billion units worth RM2.05 billion.

Domestically, Bank Islam Malaysia Bhd economist Adam Mohamed Rahim said, Malaysia's 2020 Gross Domestic Product saw a contraction of 5.6 per cent, deviating from the Ministry of Finance's range of a 3.5 per cent to 5.5 per cent drop.

"Perhaps the effect of the slightly larger-than-expected decline was cushioned by the rally in certain blue chips such as Tenaga, which rose by more than three per cent following the appointment of its new chief executive officer (CEO), a day after its previous CEO announced his exit,” he told Bernama.

Adam further said another sector which supported the local bourse was the banking sector, involving stocks such as Public Bank and Hong Leong Bank, amid the anticipation of an economic recovery this year which would boost demand for financing and lead to a decline in impairments.

Of the heavyweight gainers, Tenaga picked up 31 sen to RM10.06, Axiata advanced six sen to RM3.43, HLBank improved 18 sen to RM18.40 and PBBank was two sen higher at RM4.24.

Of the other active counters, DNeX accumulated nine sen to 43 sen and its warrant was two sen higher at 6.5 sen while SAPNRG improved half-a-sen to 13 sen and Trive slipped half-a-sen to 19 sen.

Among the gainers, MPI soared RM2.32 to RM38.60, UWC was 84 sen better at RM13.48, Tasco earned 43 sen to RM5.68 and BAT was 40 sen higher at 13.56.

On the index board, the FBM Emas Index gained 43.28 points to 11,661.82 and the FBMT 100 Index was up 34.82 points at 11,380.04.

The FBM Emas Shariah Index added 67.29 points to 13,120.25, FBM 70 jumped 110.50 points to 15,271.65 and the FBM ACE went up 135.28 points to 10,883.23.

Sector-wise, the Financial Services Index improved 16.66 points to 15,038.47, the Plantation Index shed 38.50 points to 7,145.69, and the Industrial Products and Services Index inched down 0.24 of-a-point to 180.57. ― Bernama