Rally May Stall For Taiwan Stock Market

(RTTNews) - The Taiwan stock market has finished higher in four straight sessions, collecting almost 770 points or 1.4 percent along the way. The Taiwan Stock Exchange now sits just above the 23,380-point plateau although it may spin its wheels on Monday.

The global forecast for the Asian markets is fairly directionless amidst a lack of catalysts, with oil and biotechnology stocks likely to fall under pressure. The European and U.S. markets were mixed and flat and the Asian bourses are expected to follow suit.

The TSE finished sharply higher on Friday following gains from the technology, plastic and cement sectors, while the financials were mixed.

For the day, the index jumped 269.83 points or 1.17 percent to finish at 23,383.13 after trading between 23,276.02 and 23,468.21.

Among the actives, Mega Financial collected 0.36 percent, while CTBC Financial and Fubon Financial both perked 0.16 percent, First Financial fell 0.33 percent, E Sun Financial sank 0.71 percent, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company rallied 2.21 percent, United Microelectronics Corporation and Catcher Technology both dipped 0.23 percent, Hon Hai Precision advanced 0.91 percent, Largan Precision surged 4.06 percent, MediaTek strengthened 1.44 percent, Delta Electronics jumped 2.00 percent, Novatek Microelectronics dropped 0.70 percent, Formosa Plastics spiked 2.78 percent, Nan Ya Plastics added 0.51 percent, Asia Cement improved 0.77 percent and Cathay Financial was unchanged.

The lead from Wall Street is soft as the major averages opened slightly higher on Friday but quickly turned lower before ending mixed and little changed.

The Dow shed 142.31 points or 0.32 percent to finish at 44,342.19, while the NASDAQ rose 10.06 points or 0.05 percent to close at 20,895.66 and the S&P 500 dipped 0.57 points or 0.01 percent to end at 6,296.79.

For the week, the NASDAQ jumped 1.5 percent the S&P 500 rose 0.6 percent and the Dow dipped 0.1 percent.

The weakness that emerged on Wall Street came on profit taking after the NASDAQ and the S&P 500 reached new record intraday highs at the open.

The pullback came amid a slump by shares of Netflix (NFLX), after the company reported better than expected second quarter results but warned its operating margin in the second half will be lower than the first half.

Crude oil prices turned lower on Friday after OPEC's demand forecast prompted concerns of a production surplus. West Texas Intermediate crude for August delivery closed down by $0.20 at $67.34 per barrel.