Taiwan Bourse Due For Support On Tuesday

The Taiwan stock market has moved lower in four straight sessions, stumbling almost 1,575 points or 9 percent in that span. The Taiwan Stock Exchange now sits just beneath the 20,700-point plateau although it may halt its slide on Tuesday.

The global forecast for the Asian markets is cautiously optimistic, with bargain hunting likely on the menu after heavy selling in the previous sessions. The European markets were down and the U.S. bourses were mostly higher and the Asian markets figure to follow the latter lead.

The TSE finished sharply lower on Monday with damage across the board, especially among the financial shares and technology stocks.

For the day, the index plummeted 906.99 points or 4.20 percent to finish at the daily low of 20,695.90 after peaking at 21,254.63.

Among the actives, Mega Financial shed 0.99 percent, while First Financial slumped 1.46 percent, E Sun Financial lost 3.04 percent, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company cratered 4.41 percent, United Microelectronics Corporation rose 0.22 percent, Hon Hai Precision plummeted 5.19 percent, Largan Precision dropped 1.67 percent, Catcher Technology declined 1.87 percent, MediaTek crashed 5.12 percent, Delta Electronics plunged 4.38 percent, Novatek Microelectronics tumbled 2.68 percent, Formosa Plastics retreated 2.40 percent, Nan Ya Plastics tanked 3.23 percent, Asia Cement fell 0.64 percent and Cathay Financial, CTBC Financial and Fubon Financial were unchanged.

The lead from Wall Street is positive as the major averages opened lower on Monday but tracked higher throughout the session to finish mixed.

The Dow jumped 417.86 points or 1.00 percent to finish at 42,001.76, the NASDAQ dipped 23.70 points or 0.14 percent to close at 17,299.29 and the S&P 500 added 30.91 points or 0.55 percent to end at 5,611.85.

The early weakness on Wall Street came amid ongoing concerns about the impact of President Donald Trump’s reciprocal tariffs on U.S. trade partners, which are set to begin Wednesday

Traders worry Trump’s tariffs and possible retaliatory actions by targeted countries will fuel inflation, keep interest rates elevated and drag down global economic growth.

On the U.S. economic front, MNI Indicators released a report showing an unexpected increase by its reading on Chicago-area business activity in the month of March.

Crude oil prices ticked higher on Monday on concerns that supply may not be able to keep up with demand. West Texas Intermediate for May delivery was up $0.17 or 0.25 percent to $69.53 per barrel.