Bursa Malaysia Investment Glossary

The words this site uses, defined once. Where a definition can be made precise with a number or a rule, it is — a yield computed over twelve months is defined by the window, not by an adjective. Data as of 2026-10-29.

Dividend yield
The cash a company declared per share over the last twelve months, divided by the current share price, expressed as a percentage. A RM 0.50 payout on a RM 10.00 share is 5.0%. Because the price is the denominator, a falling price raises the yield without any change in the payout — which is why a high yield is a question about the price before it is a fact about the income. See Dividend yield leaders.
Trailing yield
A yield computed from payments that have already gone ex, over the previous twelve months. It describes what was paid, not what will be. Divvy uses a twelve-month window ending on the dataset date; where the market data feed reports no yield for a stock that has declared payments, the figure is computed from those payments and the last traded price. See Methodology.
Ex-date (ex-dividend date)
The first trading day on which a buyer no longer receives the declared dividend. To be entitled you must own the shares before it — buying on the ex-date itself does not qualify. Share prices normally open lower by roughly the dividend amount on that day, so the payment is not free money. See Dividend calendar.
Pay date
The date the dividend is credited to entitled holders, typically two to four weeks after the ex-date. The dataset records it where the public entitlement listing publishes it. See Dividend calendar.
Special dividend
A one-off distribution, usually paid out of an asset sale or an unusually strong year, and not part of the regular payout. A trailing yield that includes a special overstates the income anyone should expect to repeat: MBM Resources' 16.28% includes a 20 sen special on top of its interim. See Where dividend income sits.
Payout ratio
Dividends declared as a share of earnings per share. A ratio above 100% means the company paid more than it earned, which is sustainable for one year and rarely for five. Divvy does not publish payout ratios: the earnings figure the dataset holds is quarterly and the dividend window is twelve months, so the two do not line up cleanly enough to divide.
Price-to-earnings ratio (P/E)
Share price divided by earnings per share. A P/E of 10 means the market pays RM 10 for each ringgit of annual earnings. It is only comparable between companies with similar accounting and capital structures, and it is meaningless when earnings are negative. Some stocks in the dataset carry a stored P/E that looks implausible — usually a one-off gain in the earnings figure — so Divvy makes no sector-level P/E claim. See Screener.
Market capitalisation
Share price multiplied by shares outstanding: what the market currently pays for the whole company. Bursa Malaysia is concentrated — the twenty largest companies Divvy tracks hold about 85% of the tracked market value — so a small portfolio of large caps is a concentrated bet on those names, not a diversified one. See The 20 largest companies.
Gearing (debt-to-equity)
Total debt divided by shareholders' equity. It measures how much of the balance sheet is funded by borrowing, and it matters most where cash flow is predictable: a REIT geared at 0.4 and an industrial geared at 0.4 do not carry the same risk, because the REIT's obligations are contractual and its income is regulated. See REITs by yield and gearing.
Return on equity (ROE)
Net profit as a percentage of shareholders' equity — what the company earns on the capital shareholders left in it. A high ROE funded entirely by debt is not the same achievement as a high ROE funded by retained profit, which is why ROE is read next to gearing, never alone.
REIT (real estate investment trust)
A listed vehicle that owns income-producing property and must distribute at least 90% of its distributable income to keep its tax treatment in Malaysia. That rule is why REITs pay consistently — seven of the seven Divvy tracks declared a payment in the last twelve months — and why their yield is a business model rather than a management choice. See REITs sector.
Bursa Malaysia
The exchange operator and the market it runs. Divvy covers 150 of its roughly 1,000 listings; absence from Divvy is not a judgement about a company, only a statement about coverage. See All tracked stocks.
FBM KLCI
The headline index of the 30 largest eligible companies on Bursa Malaysia, weighted by market capitalisation. Divvy does not track index membership, so a page here saying a stock is large means large in this dataset, not that it is an index constituent.
Divvy score
A 0-100 composite of reported profitability, valuation, balance sheet and income, measured against the stock's own sector template — a bank is scored on a bank's weights, a REIT on a REIT's. It does not measure momentum, sentiment, management or price history, and a high score is not a forecast of return. See How the score is built, Screener.
"Data as of"
The date the snapshot behind a page was built, and the date its prices were taken. Divvy is a snapshot site by design: every page states the date rather than implying the figures are live, because a figure without a date is a guess wearing a number's clothes. See Methodology.
Bid-ask spread
The gap between the best price a buyer offers and the best price a seller asks. It is a real cost: a 2% spread on a RM 5,000 position costs RM 100 to enter and again to leave. Small caps have wider spreads, which is the hidden tax on the higher yield they often advertise. Divvy does not hold quote depth, so no spread figure is published here.
Free float
The share of a company's stock available to public investors, as opposed to shares held by founders, families or the state. A large market cap with a small free float can trade thinly and move sharply on modest volume.
Limit up / limit down
Bursa Malaysia caps how far a price may move in one session. The limits exist to stop a single order sweeping the book, and they also mean a stock can be temporarily untradeable at the price you see. A quote refresh may show a price that no longer exists by the time you act on it.

What this page is not

It is not advice, and it is not a substitute for a prospectus. A definition tells you what a number means; it cannot tell you whether the company behind it will keep paying. For how the dataset is built and what it leaves out, read the methodology; for the yields themselves, the leaderboard; for the companies, all 150 tracked stocks.

Definitions describe reporting conventions, not investment outcomes.