22  theSun | FRIDAY NOVEMBER 28 2008

business news

STI
Hang Seng S&P/ASX200 TSEC KLCI 1,710.52 KOSPI Nikkei
13,552.06 3,588 4,453.75 869.98 0.61 1,063.48 8,373.39
182.61 48.0 181.95 13.61 33.70 160.17

KL market summary NOVEMBER 27, 2008

INDICES CHANGE
Prices end higher
BURSA Malaysia shares ended higher yes-
terday, led by gains in plantation, mining and
construction counters, a dealer said.
Sentiments were also supported by over-
night gains on Wall Street, he said.
FBMEMAS
COMPOSITE
INDUSTRIAL
CONSUMER PROD
INDUSTRIAL PROD
CONSTRUCTION
TRADING/SERVICES
5,689.11
869.98
2,090.01
275.96
67.62
155.69
120.52
+54.24
+13.61
+37.49
+1.07
+0.37
+3.03
+0.64
AirAsia X weighing
options for Europe
FINANCE 6,656.75 +124.13
The benchmark KLCI rose 13.61 points or
PROPERTIES 513.71 +4.90
1.59% to close at 869.98. It had opened 2.36 PLANTATIONS 3,865.26 103.80
points higher at 858.73. MINING 261.41 +6.08
Bank Negara Malaysia is scheduled to FBMSHA 5,894.46 +73.28
announce the third quarter gross domestic FBM2BRD 4,002.45 -39.59
product growth, which could give some direc- TECHNOLOGY 13.22 +0.11
tion to the market. TURNOVER VALUE LONDON: Malaysia’s long-haul budget financial sense will drive us,” he said.
Ramunia remained under selling pressure
706.094mil RM841.66mil carrier AirAsia X is weighing its options for The airline chief said the next step would
after MISC called off a reverse takeover. It was
Europe following the London Stansted-Kuala be to have daily flights between KL and
the most active counter, declining 14.5 sen to
Lumpur (KL) service which is set to take off London, and possibly introducing two flights a
46.5 sen and its warrants inched down 7.5 KNM which improved half a sen to 55 sen. on March 11 next year. day for the sector.
sen to 23.5 sen. Of the heavyweights, Sime Darby added 25 “The big question is whether we put all AirAsia X is scheduled to fly five times
MISC on the other hand perked 15 sen to sen to RM5.85, Public Bank went up five sen to our efforts into London and this becomes the weekly between the two cities using the
RM8.55. Other actively traded counters were RM8.45 and Tenaga Nasional was five sen higher hub for Europe, and from there (London) Airbus A340 from Air Canada.
Resorts World, which shed 21 sen to RM2.44 and at RM6.15. – Bernama people can go off to France, Germany or other Meanwhile, Azran said he would definitely
destinations, or whether we eventually have introduce daily flights to London if he could
one place in central Europe, one place in get a second A340 plane.
eastern Europe, for example,” said AirAsia To a question, he expressed hope that the
group chief executive officer Datuk Seri Tony load factor for the London sector would hover
Fernandes. in the 83-84% range.
“That’s to be debated. (AirAsia X chief “It works for us if it’s in the mid-70s in
executive officer) Azran (Osman-Rani) and his terms of breaking even. Eighty per cent is
team will look at it,” he said at the London-KL really good, but 84 and beyond is what I’m
route launch, with fares starting from £99 hoping for,” he said.
(RM499) each way. Azran said Germany is a potential
Fernandes said he personally had mixed destination for AirAsia X.
feelings about the matter. “I like the market. I made a visit to
“I think sometimes it’s good to have a lot Germany in September and it holds a lot of
of frequency in one place and then farm it promise as there are currently no direct flights
out. But it would be nice to say we’re going to (between Germany and Malaysia), and the
fly to Rome, Prague and so on. What makes Germans love to travel,” he added. – Bernama

Celcom targets 30% growth in

corporate business revenue
KUALA LUMPUR: Celcom (Malaysia) Bhd is
optimistic of achieving a 20-30% growth in its
corporate business revenue next year following
its partnership with Dell Malaysia and Voda-
fone.
Its senior vice-president, Enterprise Services,
Farid Yunus said the partnership had been
fruitful as evident from the success in securing
contracts from large multinational companies
(MNCs).
“The industry has been growing 10% year-
on-year but we are likely to see business growth
of two or three times more than that,” he told
reporters after launching the Dell Latitude note-
books with Celcom built-in mobile broadband
here yesterday.
Farid said currently, out of Celcom’s 7.9
million customers, 10 to 20% are corporate
customers.
The new notebooks, which are custom made
for Celcom’s corporate clients, offer instant wide
area broadband access and have a starting price
from RM4,399.
“We are partnering with Dell and Vodafone
to offer our business customers greater con-
venience, functionality and reduced total cost
of ownership,” he added.
Meanwhile, Dell Malaysia managing director
Pang Yee Beng said the company believed that
corporate customers will find the new product
to be an answer to cost-cutting initiatives to
mitigate the impact of the global financial
crisis.
Celcom business users will also enjoy free
unlimited 3G data access for one month and
enjoy a discounted rate of RM50 per month for
the subsequent six months.
As at September this year, Celcom had about
179,000 subscribers for its data plan, Farid said.
– Bernama

EON Bank expects to disburse

RM100m in personal loans
KUALA LUMPUR: EON Bank expects to
disburse RM100 million from its newly
launched EON Bank Personal Loan scheme
over the next 12 months, despite troubled
economic conditions.
“This personal loan promises a 48-hour
turn-around time,” group chief executive
officer, Albert Lau Yiong told a media
conference after the personal loan product
launch yesterday.
Applicants must be above 21 years
with a minimum income of RM24,000
per annum to be eligible to apply for the
personal loan which ranges from RM5,000
to RM250,000.
The loan comes with a flexible
repayment period of between two to six
years, with an interest rate as low as
0.75% per month and a free personal loan
protection.
EON Bank account holders will enjoy
additional savings of 0.5% a year on the
interest.
Touching on loan growth this year, the
head of group consumer banking, Michael
Lor Chee Leng said that the bank was on
track to achieve a growth of between 6 and
8%.
“To grow our business, we are
adopting a customer-centric approach,
as we increase cross-selling activities to
the existing 1.4 million customers and
utilise a strong distribution network of 137
branches,” added Lau.
EON Bank plans to open six new
branches next year with an investment of
RM1.5 million each.
“We also plan to refurbish the 50 existing
branches. This year we have refurbished
30 branches with the investment of RM1
million each,” he said.
Meanwhile, EON Bank also announced
a reduction of its base lending rate by 25
basis point to 6.5% from 6.75% effective
Dec 1, following the downward revision of
the overnight policy rate by Bank Negara
Malaysia.
However, the bank’s net interest margin
will not be much affected by the cutback,
Lor said. – Bernama