Profit Taking Expected For Taiwan Stock Market

(RTTNews) - The Taiwan stock market has tracked higher in four straight sessions, improving more than 1,000 points or 4.3 percent in that span. The Taiwan Stock Exchange now rests just above the 23,260-point plateau although it's likely to open under pressure on Friday.

The global forecast for the Asian markets is flat to lower ahead of key U.S. employment data later today. The European markets were slightly higher and the U.S. bourses were slightly lower and the Asian markets figure to follow the latter lead.

The TSE finished slightly higher on Thursday as gains from the financial shares were offset by weakness from the technology companies.

For the day, the index perked 12.61 points or 0.05 percent to finish at 23,267.94 after trading between 23,225.31 and 23,387.17.

Among the actives, Cathay Financial collected 0.29 percent, while Mega Financial perked 0.25 percent, First Financial and E Sun Financial both added 0.54 percent, Fubon Financial gained 0.77 percent, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company increased 0.47 percent, United Microelectronics Corporation tumbled 1.91 percent, Hon Hai Precision and Catcher Technology both skidded 1.00 percent, Largan Precision slumped 1.18 percent, MediaTek rose 0.38 percent, Delta Electronics dropped 0.89 percent, Novatek Microelectronics improved 0.72 percent, Formosa Plastics tanked 2.17 percent, Nan Ya Plastics stumbled 2.07 percent, Asia Cement perked 0.12 percent and CTBC Financial was unchanged.

The lead from Wall Street is weak as the major averages opened flat on Thursday and hugged the line for much of the day before slipping under water heading into the close.

The Dow slumped248.33 points or 0.55 percent to finish at 44,765.71, while the NASDAQ shed 34.86 points or 0.18 percent to close at 19,700.26 and the S&P 600 fell 11.38 points or 0.19 percent to end at 6,075.11.

Overall trading activity was somewhat subdued as traders were reluctant to make significant moves ahead of the release of the Labor Department's closely watched monthly jobs report later today.

The jobs data could impact the outlook for interest rates ahead of the Federal Reserve's next monetary policy meeting later this month.

While traders have recently expressed greater confidence the Fed will lower rates by another 25 basis points at the December meeting, there remains uncertainty about the likelihood of continued rate cuts at future meetings.

Crude oil prices dipped on Thursday, weighed by weak demand from China and rising production in the United States - although the downside was limited by OPEC's decision to delay a production increase. West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures for January fell $0.24 or 0.4 percent at $68.30 a barrel.