Stocks close near three-month high despite US slump

Shares ended at a near three-month high yesterday, led by optical-memory-disk makers.

The TAIEX rose 29.62 points, or 0.5 percent, to 6,137.57, its highest closing level since finishing at 6,155.51 on March 14. A total of 546 stocks gained, 328 fell and 126 remained unchanged.

"Given declines in US shares Friday and big rallies here recently, the market's performance today was a pleasant surprise," Ta Ching Securities Co (大慶證券) trader Daniel Liu said.

Among the day's biggest gainers were optical-memory-disk makers, spurred by talks that prices of digital video discs will be raised in the third quarter. Ritek Corp (錸德) surged 6.9 percent to NT$13.1 and CMC Magnetics Corp (中環) rose 1.6 percent to NT$16.2.

Shares for thin-film-transistor liquid-crystal-display stocks performed poorly on continuing concerns over panel prices due to oversupply. AU Optronics Corp (友達光電) slipped 1 percent to NT$51.5.

Chip-related stocks mostly gained, following a Chinese-language newspaper report that cited research firm IC Insights as saying the global chip industry's production value could rise 4 percent on year in 2005, compared with its previous estimate of a 2 percent decline.

Taiwan Semiconductor Manu-facturing Co (台積電) rose 0.7 percent to NT$58.1 and United Microelectronics Corp (聯電) gained 0.9 percent to NT$22.4.

Construction shares leapt 5.6 percent and tourism stocks rose 3.5 percent on expectations that Chinese tourists would flock to Taiwan. China has offered to allow more of its people to visit Taiwan, but there has been no progress on the plan so far.