Tech Shares May Lead Taiwan Stock Market Higher

(RTTNews) - The Taiwan stock market has moved higher in three straight sessions, rallying almost 650 points or 3.8 percent along the way. The Taiwan Stock Exchange now sits just above the 17,815-point plateau and it may extend its winning streak on Tuesday.

The global forecast for the Asian markets is upbeat on optimism over upcoming earnings, especially among the technology stocks. The European and U.S. markets were up and the Asian bourses are expected to open in similar fashion.

The TSE finished modestly higher on Monday following mixed performances from the financial shares, technology stocks and cement companies.

For the day, the index improved 133.58 points or 0.76 percent to finish at 17,815.10 after trading between 17,765.13 and 17,869.07.

Among the actives, Cathay Financial was up 0.11 percent, while Mega Financial collected 0.53 percent, CTBC Financial climbed 1.08 percent, First Financial eased 0.19 percent, Fubon Financial rose 0.32 percent, E Sun Financial lost 0.61 percent, United Microelectronics Corporation spiked 2.24 percent, Hon Hai Precision shed 0.60 percent, Largan Precision sank 0.80 percent, Catcher Technology slid 0.25 percent, MediaTek perked 0.22 percent, Delta Electronics rallied 2.11 percent, Novatek Microelectronics added 0.58 percent, Formosa Plastics sank 0.84 percent, Nan Ya Plastics dropped 0.83 percent, Asia Cement gained 0.38 percent, Taiwan Cement fell 0.31 percent, China Steel improved 0.41 percent and Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company was unchanged.

The lead from Wall Street is positive as the major averages opened solidly higher, with the Dow and S&P hitting fresh record intraday highs; they faded as the day progressed but still ended well in the green.

The Dow climbed 138.01 points or 0.36 percent to finish at 38,001.81, while the NASDAQ gained 49.32 points or 0.32 percent to close at 15,360.29 and the S&P 500 rose 10.62 points or 0.22 percent to end at 4,850.43.

The early strength on Wall Street came on continued optimism about the outlook for earnings from major tech firms, with Intel (INTC), IBM Corp. (IBM) and Netflix (NFLX) among the companies due to release their quarterly results this week.

In economic news, the Conference Board noted a modest decrease in its index of leading U.S. economic indicators in December, continuing to signal underlying weakness in the U.S. economy.

Oil prices rose sharply on Monday amid concerns about possible supply disruptions in the Middle East, and extreme cold weather in North America. West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures for February settled at $75.19 a barrel, gaining $1.78 or about 2.4 percent.