Soft Start Anticipated For Taiwan Stock Market

The Taiwan stock market has moved lower in four straight sessions, tumbling almost 850 points or 3.6 percent along the way. The Taiwan Stock Exchange now rests just above the 22,715-point plateau and it’s expected to open to the downside again on Friday.

The global forecast for the Asian markets is soft on 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 modestly lower on Thursday following losses from the financial shares, technology stocks and plastics companies.

For the day, the index lost 144.85 points or 0.63 percent to finish at 22,715.38 after trading between 22,619.71 and 22,893.82.

Among the actives, Mega Financial sank 0.76 percent, while CTBC Financial collected 0.27 percent, First Financial stumbled 1.50 percent, Fubon Financial shed 0.77 percent, E Sun Financial retreated 1.48 percent, United Microelectronics Corporation surrendered 1.75 percent, Hon Hai Precision slumped 1.40 percent, Largan Precision tumbled 1.70 percent, Catcher Technology declined 1.61 percent, MediaTek skidded 1.59 percent, Delta Electronics dropped 1.14 percent, Novatek Microelectronics plunged 2.55 percent, Formosa Plastics plummeted 3.35 percent, Nan Ya Plastics lost 2.34 percent, Asia Cement fell 0.33 percent and Cathay Financial and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company were unchanged.

The lead from Wall Street is weak as the major averages opened flat on Thursday but quickly fell into the red and stayed that way, ending near session lows.

The Dow dropped 207.33 points or 0.47 percent to finish at 43,750.86, while the NASDAQ slumped 123.07 points or 0.64 percent to close at 19,107.65 and the S&P 500 sank 36.21 points or 0.60 percent to end at 5,949.17.

The weakness that emerged on Wall Street late in the session came after Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell said the central bank does not “need to be in a hurry to lower rates” due to the strength of the economy.

Powell’s remarks came as the latest batch of U.S. economy data generated some uncertainty about the outlook for interest rates after the Labor Department said first-time claims for U.S. jobless benefits unexpectedly edged lower last week.

While the Fed is still widely expected to lower interest rates by a quarter point next month, there is some concern that sticky inflation will lead the central bank to slow the pace of its rate cuts in early 2025.

Oil futures settled higher on Thursday, supported by data showing a drop in gasoline stockpiles. West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures for December closed up $0.27 or about 0.4 percent at $68.70 a barrel.