Profit Taking Anticipated For Taiwan Shares

The Taiwan stock market has moved higher in seven straight sessions, accelerating more than 750 points or 4.8 percent along the way. The Taiwan Stock Exchange now sits just beneath the 16,750-point plateau although investors are expected to cash in on Friday.

The global forecast for the Asian markets is mixed to lower on renewed concerns over the outlook for interest rates. The European markets were up and the U.S. bourses were down and the Asian markets figure to follow the latter lead.

The TSE finished barely higher on Thursday following gains from the technology and plastic sectors, while the financials came in mixed.

For the day, the index added 4.82 points or 0.03 percent to finish at 16,745.65 after trading between 16,680.91 and 16,759.43.

Among the actives, Cathay Financial perked 0.22 percent, while CTBC Financial collected 1.00 percent, First Financial eased 0.19 percent, E Sun Financial shed 0.41 percent, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company rose 0.18 percent, United Microelectronics Corporation added 0.21 percent, Hon Hai Precision advanced 0.93 percent, Catcher Technology improved 0.82 percent, MediaTek dropped 0.98 percent, Delta Electronics increased 0.33 percent, Novatek Microelectronics climbed 1.15 percent, Formosa Plastics gained 0.51 percent, Nan Ya Plastics rallied 1.24 percent, Asia Cement was up 0.12 percent, China Steel lost 0.20 percent and Largan Precision, Mega Financial, Fubon Financial and Taiwan Cement were unchanged.

The lead from Wall Street is negative as the major averages opened flat on Thursday and hugged the line for the first half of the day before turning lower to end solidly in the red.

The Dow stumbled 220.33 points or 0.65 percent to finish at 33,891.94, while the NASDAQ sank 128.97 points or 0.94 percent to end at 13,521.45 and the S&P 500 lost 35.43 points or 0.81 percent to close at 4,347.35.

Stocks showed a notable drop in early afternoon trading after the Treasury Department revealed this month’s auction of $24 billion worth of 30-year bonds attracted below average demand, triggering a surge in treasury yields.

The markets saw further downside as Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell addressed the outlook for U.S. monetary policy, saying the central bank “will not hesitate” to resume raising interest rates if it becomes appropriate.

Participating in a policy panel in Washington, D.C., Powell acknowledged that U.S. inflation has slowed over the past year but pointed out it remains well above the Fed’s 2 percent target.

Crude oil prices climbed higher on Thursday after two straight sessions of decline on concerns about the outlook for energy demand. West Texas Intermediate crude oil futures for December rose $0.41 or 0.5 percent at $75.74 a barrel, due to some short-covering and bargain hunting.