Taiwan Stock Market May Take Further Damage On Friday

(RTTNews) - The Taiwan stock market has moved lower in back-to-back sessions, slumping almost 38 points or 2.2 percent along the way. The Taiwan Stock Exchange now sits just above the 16,760-point plateau and it may see continued consolidation on Friday.

The global forecast for the Asian markets is broadly negative on growing concerns about the outlook for interest rates. The European and U.S. markets were down and the Asian markets figure to open in similar fashion.

The TSE finished sharply lower on Thursday with damage across the board, especially among the financials, technology stocks and cement companies.

For the day, the index tumbled 294.26 points or 1.73 percent to finish at 16,762.17 after trading between 16,749.29 and 17,017.09.

Among the actives, Cathay Financial stumbled 1.62 percent, while Mega Financial declined 2.09 percent, CTBC Financial surrendered 1.80 percent, First Financial slumped 1.44 percent, Fubon Financial skidded 1.15 percent, E Sun Financial weakened 1.34 percent, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company tanked 2.92 percent, United Microelectronics Corporation fell 0.41 percent, Hon Hai Precision tumbled 2.76 percent, Largan Precision spiked 2.89 percent, Catcher Technology retreated 1.98 percent, MediaTek dropped 1.00 percent, Delta Electronics plunged 3.28 percent, Novatek Microelectronics shed 0.68 percent, Formosa Plastics dove 1.77 percent, Nan Ya Plastics plunged 2.26 percent, Asia Cement lost 1.34 percent, Taiwan Cement sank 1.46 percent and China Steel was down 1.86 percent..

The lead from Wall Street suggests consolidation as the major averages opened firmly lower on Thursday and remained in the red throughout the trading day.

The Dow plunged 366.38 points or 1.07 percent to finish at 33,922.26, while the NASDAQ tumbled 112.61 points or 0.82 percent to close at 13,679.04 and the S&P 500 sank 35.23 points or 0.79 percent to end at 4,411.59.

The early sell-off on Wall Street came as a batch of largely upbeat U.S. economic data added to concerns about the outlook for interest rates following Wednesday's hawkish Federal Reserve minutes.

Before the start of trading, payroll processor ADP released a report showing much stronger than expected private sector job growth in June. While the surge in private sector employment paints a positive picture of the economy, it also may convince the Fed to resume raising interest rates.

The Institute for Supply Management also released a report showing the pace of growth in the service sector accelerated by much more than expected in June.

Oil futures settled roughly flat on Thursday with traders weighing the impact of higher interest rates on growth and energy demand against data showing a drop in crude inventories. West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures for August settled at $71.80 a barrel, up a penny from the previous close.

Closer to home, Taiwan will release June trade data later today; in May, imports were down 21.7 percent on year and exports fell 14.1 percent for a trade surplus of $4.89 billion.