As results sink in, big winners are KL tycoons and Lynas as stocks rally
(TMI) – The 59-year-old prime minister could now come under pressure from conservatives in his own ruling party for not delivering a stronger majority despite a robust economy and a US$2.6 billion deluge of social handouts to poor families.
Stocks surged as much as 6.8 per cent this morning and the ringgit jumped to a 10-month high, after Barisan Nasional (BN) extended its 56-year rule and fended off a strong opposition challenge that had unnerved investors.
The benchmark FTSE Bursa Malaysia KLCI Index rose to a lifetime high of 1,808.90 by 9.02am in response to yesterday’s general election, with stocks linked to the coalition and its favoured tycoons gaining handsomely, Reuters reported this morning.
BN won 133 seats in the 222-member Parliament in the election, although it failed to regain the two-thirds majority it lost for the first time in 2008.
It also lost the popular vote.
With all results in, BN polled 5.220 million votes to Pakatan Rakyat’s 5.489 million, for a deficit of 269,130 votes based on calculations by The Malaysian Insider. The Election Commission has yet to release the official results.
This was proportionally down from the 4.082 million votes the coalition polled in Election 2008, against the 3.796 million that the parties of PKR, the DAP, and PAS collected then.
The last time an Umno-led coalition lost the popular vote was in 1969, then contested by BN’s predecessor, the Alliance Party.
But the repercussions of its win were felt beyond Malaysian shores.
Read more at: http://www.themalaysianinsider.com/malaysia/article/as-results-sink-in-big-winners-are-kl-tycoons-and-lynas-as-stocks-rally/
