Taiwan Bourse May Head South Again On Monday

(RTTNews) - The Taiwan stock market on Friday ended the three-day losing streak in which it had dropped more than 425 points or 3 percent. The Taiwan Stock Exchange now rests just above the 14,700-point plateau although it's likely to open under pressure again on Monday.

The global forecast for the Asian markets is soft on recession concerns and 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 sharply higher on Friday following gains from the steel, plastic and cement sectors, while the financials and technology stocks were mixed.

For the day, the index climbed 152.43 points or 1.05 percent to finish at 14,705.43 after trading between 14,464.20 and 14,742.79.

Among the actives, Cathay Financial collected 0.86 percent, while Mega Financial perked 0.16 percent, CTBC Financial shed 0.44 percent, Fubon Financial advanced 0.88 percent, First Financial lost 0.38 percent, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company rallied 2.12 percent, United Microelectronics Corporation spiked 2.35 percent, Hon Hai Precision added 0.49 percent, Largan Precision tanked 2.45 percent, Catcher Technology fell 0.29 percent, MediaTek soared 3.40 percent, Novatek Microelectronics gained 0.50 percent, China Steel was up 0.35 percent, Formosa Plastics improved 0.69 percent, Nan Ya Plastics rose 0.27 percent, Asia Cement climbed 0.85 percent, Taiwan Cement strengthened 1.51 percent and Delta Electronics and E Sun Financial were unchanged.

The lead from Wall Street is negative as the major averages opened in the red, ticked higher midday but slumped going into the close.

The Dow dropped 305.04 points or 0.90 percent to finish at 33,476.46, while the NASDAQ sank 77.38 points or 0.70 percent to close at 11,004.62 and the S&P 500 lost 29.13 points or 0.73 percent to end at 3,934.38.

For the week, the NASDAQ plunged 4.0 percent, the S&P sank 3.4 percent and the Dow dropped 2.8 percent.

The late-day weakness on Wall Street came as traders looked ahead to this week's highly anticipated Federal Reserve meeting.

While the Fed is widely expected to slow the pace of interest rate hikes to 50 basis points, traders have recently expressed concerns about how much further the Fed will need to raise rates in order to contain inflation.

Adding to concerns about the outlook for interest rates, the Labor Department said U.S producer prices increased more than expected last month. But the negative sentiment was partly offset by a report from the University of Michigan showing a decrease in consumers' inflation expectations.

Crude oil futures fell on Friday. weighed down by concerns about the outlook for energy demand due to a possible global economic recession amid policy tightening by central banks. West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures for January ended lower by $0.44 or 0.6 percent at $71.02 a barrel. WTI crude futures sank 11.6 percent in the week.