Taiwan Shares May Head South Again On Tuesday

The Taiwan stock market on Monday wrote a finish to the three-day losing streak in which it had tumbled almost 350 points or 2.2 percent. The Taiwan Stock Exchange now rests just above the 15,560-point plateau although it may see renewed selling pressure on Tuesday.

The global forecast for the Asian markets is mixed to lower on continuing fears of a financial crisis. The European markets were sharply lower and the U.S. bourses were mixed and little changed and the Asian markets figure to follow the latter lead.

The TSE finished modestly higher on Monday as gains from the technology and plastic stocks were tempered by weakness from the financial sector.

For the day, the index perked 34.29 points or 0.22 percent to finish at 15,560.49 after trading between 15,349.67 and 15,571.17.

Among the actives, Cathay Financial dropped 0.94 percent, while Mega Financial fell 0.31 percent, CTBC Financial dipped 0.22 percent, Fubon Financial skidded 1.03 percent, First Financial shed 0.38 percent, E Sun Financial sank 0.81 percent, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company added 0.58 percent, United Microelectronics Corporation advanced 0.96 percent, Hon Hai Precision climbed 0.98 percent, Largan Precision jumped 1.69 percent, Catcher Technology gained 0.81 percent, MediaTek improved 1.06 percent, Delta Electronics added 0.69 percent, Novatek Microelectronics gathered 0.94 percent, Formosa Plastics increased 0.33 percent, Nan Ya Plastics rallied 0.95 percent, Taiwan Cement perked 0.14 percent and Asia Cement was unchanged.

The lead from Wall Street offers little clarity as the major averages spent most of Monday bouncing back and forth across the unchanged line before finally ending mixed and little changed.

The Dow dropped 90.50 points or 0.28 percent to finish at 31,819.14, while the NASDAQ added 49.96 points or 0.45 percent to close at 11,188.84 and the S&P 500 dipped 5.83 points or 0.15 percent to end at 3,855.76.

The weakness that emerged on Wall Street came on continued concerns over the fallout from the Silicon Valley Bank collapse – which triggered heavy selling, particularly in the banking sector.

Over the weekend, the U.S. Treasury, Federal Reserve, and Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation said they would “fully protect” depositors, including those with assets above the federally guaranteed $250,000 limit, but traders were not reassured.

Investors are also nervous ahead of the ECB meeting and key inflation data due out later this week.

Crude oil prices fell sharply on Monday amid worries that a U.S. banking debacle may follow last week’s collapse of Silicon Valley Bank. West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures settled lower by $1.88 or 2.4 percent at $74.80 a barrel.

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