Taiwan stocks closed 0.55 percent higher on Thursday, led by gains in major exporters like smartphone maker HTC and top contract chip maker TSMC, after gains on Wall Street boosted Asian markets. The main TAIEX share index rose 44.16 points to 8,096.86, following a two-day slide from a more than 6-1/2-year closing high on Monday.
Turnover was moderate at T$97.04 billion ($2.9 billion), higher than T$86.04 billion in the previous day. "Major exporters to the US were strong today, especially tech stocks, after an overnight Wall Street rally," said Mega Securities vice president Alex Huang.
The heavily weighted electronics sub-index rose 0.68 percent, while the financial sub-index slipped 0.04 percent. Smartphone maker HTC rose 2.23 percent after its Chief Executive Officer Peter Chou said the company saw revenue rising 15-20 percent in the second quarter from the first.
Index heavyweight Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC) ended 0.74 percent higher. The company said as the market closed that April sales figures dropped 17 percent from a year ago, but the figure improved from March amid a cyclical recovery.
Smaller rival United Microelectronics Corp (UMC) gained 0.51 percent. UMC posted a 4 percent fall in April sales from a year ago earlier in the week. Fu Sheng Industrial Co, the world's largest golf club maker, rose 2.06 percent after US's Oaktree Capital said it was offering T$37.50 per share in a cash tender offer. Quanta Computer, the world's largest contract laptop computer maker, rose 0.31 percent.
Smaller rival Compal Electronics rose 1.68 percent. The Commercial Times reported that Compal could catch up to Quanta this year as Compal's laptop sales have risen close to Quanta's level. Shin Kong Financial Holding, Taiwan's eighth-largest financial firm by assets, fell 1.07 percent despite saying that the embedded value of its insurance arm grew 30 percent last year.
Comments
Comments are closed.