Articles Published 31 July 2026

AI Narrative Localization and Sectoral Co-Movement in Malaysia

Juan Zhang
Universiti Putra Malaysia ·Institute for Mathematical Research (INSPEM), Universiti Putra Malaysia, Malaysia
Lin Yihuan
School of Business and Economics, Universiti Putra Malaysia, Malaysia
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Abstract

Global technology narratives do not become locally price-relevant in smaller emerging markets in a uniform way. Evidence from Malaysian equity linkages shows that artificial intelligence (AI) narrative localization is selective rather than broad-based. Global technology sentiment alone does not uniformly reshape domestic sectoral co-movement. The strongest and most robust post-break evidence appears in the technology–utilities linkage, identifying the compute–power nexus as the main channel through which AI-related attention became visible in Malaysian market linkages. Property/REIT-related linkages move in the expected direction, but they remain weaker under conservative inference and more sensitive to proxy construction. These findings indicate that AI narrative localization depends on concrete domestic implementation constraints rather than generic thematic exposure. The paper contributes to narrative economics and investor-attention research by documenting the boundary conditions under which a global technology story becomes observable in local equity pricing.

Keywords
Artificial intelligence narrative localization sectoral co-movement infrastructure emerging markets Malaysia.

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AI Narrative Localization and Sectoral Co-Movement in Malaysia. (2026). Journal of Business Management and Accounting, 16(2), 206-227. https://doi.org/10.32890/jbma2026.16.2.5

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DOI · 10.32890/jbma2026.16.2.5
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References

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