Fears over share-dumping allayed

To ease concerns over a hurried outflow from Taiwanese stocks by overseas investors, Securities and Futures Commission Chairman Ding Kung-hwa (丁克華) yesterday said that foreign institutional investors still have US$75 billion worth of investment here.

Ding made the remark following a closed-door meeting with Minister of Finance Lin Chuan (林全) after the minister expressed concern over recent stock market fluctuations that have been partially triggered by share-dumping by foreign investors.

Despite foreign investors having sold off Taiwanese shares worth NT$80 billion in the past 10 days, Ding said that they haven't completely abandoned the local stock market, since the capital inflow as of the end of last month stood at NT$76 billion.

Although foreign investors dumped NT$40 billion worth of Taiwanese shares early this month, a total of US$75 billion in foreign capital remains in the country, Ding said.

Ding urged investors to remain calm as stocks closed 1.05 percent higher yesterday while investors regained confidence in light of the nation's solid economic fundamentals, which encouraged bargain hunting after the recent steep falls.

The TAIEX closed 61.31 points higher at 5,886.36, with a turnover of NT$89.2 billion. The benchmark index lost 3.56 percent to 5825.05 on Monday, the lowest point this year, as investors left the market amid fears over the recount of presidential election votes and a possible rise in US interest rates.

Overseas investors sold a net NT$3.97 billion of shares yesterday, down from a net NT$10.8 billion of shares sold on Monday, according to the Taiwan Stock Exchange Corp. As of last Friday, foreign institutional investors had bought NT$1.3733 trillion in shares this year and sold NT$1.3104 trillion, the exchange said.

The market value of the shares owned by foreign institutional investors amounted to NT$2.9113 trillion, accounting for 21.95 percent of the market value of listed stocks.

Lin yesterday also met bankers from Citibank Taiwan, including its head, Chan Tze-ching (陳子政), and chief financial officer, Morris Li (利明獻), but the ministry didn't disclose the content of their discussions.

The local Chinese-language media yesterday speculated that the matter under discussion might have something to do with foreign investors. Citibank denied this, however.