Asian stocks provided a final dose of Christmas cheer and closed mostly higher on Friday in low volumes with many investors sidelined ahead of the holiday period, dealers said.
They said sentiment received a boost by modest gains on Wall Street overnight and this, coupled with foreign investor buying, helped Taipei to finish at its highest levels for the year.
Such interest also contributed to gains in Seoul and Sydney, where both markets again struck record highs, while Manila was another strong performer with investors beginning to position for next year.
However, broader interest was also subdued with Tokyo closed for the day while most markets will also shut tomorrow and Tuesday for Christmas-related public holidays.
That lack of interest resulted in Hong Kong finishing flat while Jakarta and Kuala Lumpur recorded modest falls, and Mumbai bucked the trend by falling 1.23 percent amid profit taking on recent hefty gains.
The TAIEX found support from modest gains on Wall Street overnight and foreign investor interest in semiconductor and flat-panel display makers. The weighted index rose 95.43 points to 6,512.63 on turnover of NT$113.97 billion (US$3.43 billion).
The central bank's latest increase in its key interest rates by 12.50 basis points had a muted impact as the move had been expected and priced in, dealers said.
Daniel Tseng (曾建詮), a manager at Fubon Securities Investment Services Co (富邦投顧), said the market readily regained momentum as local investors kept up with the purchases done by their foreign counterparts despite the long break in Asia for the Christmas and New Year holidays.
"The still solid prospect of a bullish January encouraged local institutions to do more window-dressing for 2005," he said.
"To date, there have been no signs to lead us into taking a bearish outlook towards either Wall Street or the Taiwan market in the near term," he added.
Tokyo markets were closed.
Seoul
Seoul share prices closed 0.64 percent higher, chalking up another record finish with large-cap IT stocks leading the gains for a second day.
Dealers said investors showed little response to an announcement by investigators that cloning expert Hwang Woo-Suk had faked his controversial stem-cell research paper.
"Large-cap stocks seemed to continue to dictate the market tone," Woori Investment and Securities analyst Hwang Chang-joong said.
The KOSPI index rose 8.66 points to 1,359.53.
Hong Kong share prices closed flat in thin trading as most investors stayed on the sidelines ahead of the long Christmas weekend.
"The market was very quiet because most investors didn't want to take any significant positions ahead of the Christmas holidays," said Howard Gorges, vice chairman at South China Securities.
The Hang Seng Index closed up 1.05 points at 15,183.58.
Shanghai share prices closed 0.84 percent higher on continued window-dressing by institutional investors, with telecoms finding some favor again.
Dealers repeated that there was no real significance to the gains, with the market continuing to trade in a narrow range in the absence of any decisive lead on the policy front to get it out of the current rut.
The Shanghai A-share Index added 10.06 points to 1,204.06, while the Shenzhen A-share Index was up 2.83 points or 1.00 percent at 287.15.
The benchmark Shanghai Composite Index, which covers A and B-shares, rose 9.63 points or 0.85 percent to 1,144.87.
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