Weekly Market Update - 6 April 2015

Market Outlook 

Equity Market Outlook

• Last week, US released March’s employment numbers which were worse than expected. Consequently the US Dollar has weakened across the board, as the market expectations for Federal Reserves’ imminent tightening in June will be delayed further given the disappointing payrolls data.
• Meanwhile the Ringgit strengthened to MYR3.62 against the USD. This will encourage more foreign investment inflows.
• We expect regional and local equity markets to be range-bound until the release of the first quarter corporate results which are expected to be out later this month.

Fixed Income Outlook 

• The Malaysian Government Securities (MGS) market rallied across the curve last week by about 3 basis points on the back of foreign interest, after poor economic data saw investors moving back into emerging markets for higher yield. The Ringgit traded stronger against the US Dollar after the non-farm payroll figures were published. Foreign investors were particularly interested in the Islamic government securities which caused spreads between the Government Investment Issue (GII) and MGS to compress.
• On the local economic data front, exports contracted by 9.7% against the expected contraction of 1.4%. That saw trade balance reduce to RM4.5bil against previous month of RM9.1bil.

Source: Lipper for Investment Management


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