(RTTNews) – The Taiwan stock market has moved higher in three straight sessions, accelerating almost 680 points or 3.2 percent along the way. The Taiwan Stock Exchange now sits just beneath the 21,675-point plateau although investors may cash in on Friday.
The global forecast for the Asian markets suggests caution ahead of key U.S. employment data later in the day. The European markets were mixed and the U.S. bourses were slightly lower and the Asian markets figure to split the difference.
The TSE finished modestly higher on Thursday following gains from the plastics and mixed performances from the financial shares and technology stocks.
For the day, the index added 56.34 points or 0.26 percent to finish at 21,674.43 after trading between 21,626.74 and 21,738.93.
Among the actives, Cathay Financial fell 0.33 percent, while Mega Financial shed 0.38 percent, First Financial strengthened 1.49 percent, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company improved 0.81 percent, United Microelectronics Corporation retreated 1.41 percent, Hon Hai Precision dipped 0.32 percent, MediaTek stumbled 2.35 percent, Delta Electronics rallied 2.31 percent, Formosa Plastics jumped 1.93 percent, Nan Ya Plastics spiked 2.49 percent, Asia Cement gained 0.60 percent and CTBC Financial, Fubon Financial, E Sun Financial, Largan Precision, Catcher Technology and Novatek Microelectronics were unchanged.
The lead from Wall Street is negative as the major averages opened mixed but spent most of the day bouncing back and forth across the unchanged line before finishing modestly under water.
The Dow dropped 108.00 points or 0.25 percent to finish at 42,319.74, while the NASDAQ stumbled 162.04 points or 0.83 percent to close at 19,298.45 and the S&P 500 sank 31.51 points or 0.53 percent to end at 5,939.30.
Stocks saw some strength earlier in the day after President Donald Trump confirmed in a post on Truth Social that he had an approximately 90-minute phone call with Chinese President Xi Jinping.
However, traders seemed reluctant to make more significant moves ahead of the release of the Labor Department’s closely watched monthly jobs report on Friday.
The data could have a significant impact on the outlook for the economy following Wednesday’s weaker than expected reports on private sector employment and service sector activity.
In the bond market, treasuries pulled into negative territory after seeing early strength. Subsequently, the yield on the benchmark ten-year note, which moves opposite of its price, rose 2.9 basis points to 4.394 percent, after hitting a nearly one-month intraday low of 4.318 percent.
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