Shares closed 0.49 percent lower yesterday as investors retreated from building up positions after seeing markets around the region declining over the lackluster performance on Wall Street overnight, dealers said.
Global concerns amid lingering worries over the US housing mortgage defaults triggered local selling, offsetting initial trading interest spurred by the government's upward revision of the economic growth forecast for this year, they said.
The government announced on Thursday it was raising its GDP growth forecast to 4.58 percent from its estimate of 4.38 percent.
The TAIEX closed down 42.75 points at 8,690.09, on turnover of NT$131.70 billion (US$3.99 billion). Decliners outnumbered advancers 995 to 675, with 215 stocks unchanged.
Kevin Chung (鐘國忠), manager at Jih Sun Securities Investment Consulting Co (日盛投顧), said the domestic market faced both stop-loss selling and profit-taking pressure during the session.
"Riding on a recent recovery from last week's lows, short-term players were eager to lock in profits, while those who built up portfolios at a much higher cost cut positions to stop the losses," Chung said.
For the week to yesterday, the weighted index closed up 599.80 points or 7.41 percent after a 9.42 percent decline a week earlier.
Average daily turnover stood at NT$132.65 billion, compared with NT$162.07 billion for the preceding week.
Shares of BenQ (明基) closed up NT$0.40 at NT$16.30 as the company posted a second-quarter net profit of NT$570 million, reversing a NT$1.76 billion loss in the first quarter.
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