Europe's main stock markets will look to extend their fragile recovery next week following recent rocky trading that was linked to fears of a global credit crunch.
London's FTSE 100 index of leading shares finished Friday at 6,220.10 points, a hefty gain of 155.9 points or 2.57 percent from a week earlier.
Frankfurt's DAX 30 jumped 1.74 percent over the week to finish at 7,507.27 and the Paris CAC 40 rocketed 3.84 percent in value to 5,569.38 points.
Stock market watchers said that current share price levels represented a great buying opportunity for investors.
"European equities still look attractive," ABN Amro analyst Ian Richards said.
"Despite the plentiful headlines surrounding US subprime mortgage problems, US economic prospects look robust. In Europe, momentum continues to accelerate, reflecting domestic activity strength alongside buoyant exports. And the picture looks equally encouraging in Asia," he said.
European and US stocks continued their rebound on Friday as better than expected US housing data defused some of the gloom which has beset financial markets.
After struggling earlier on Friday, the markets rose as a government survey revealed a surprise rebound in new US home sales last month.
The US Commerce Department reported that new home sales rose by a surprising 2.8 percent. A separate snapshot on durable goods orders also supported the gains.
Dealers said that central bank efforts have also helped equity markets recover from recent heavy losses amid fears of a credit squeeze.
Investors have also been soothed by the prospect of an interest rate cut some time soon in the US, the world's biggest economy. More and more US households are failing to keep up with payments on home loans in the US subprime mortgage sector.
Hong Kong authorities ramped up sales of the local dollar as the greenback’s slide threatened the foreign-exchange peg. The Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) sold a record HK$60.5 billion (US$7.8 billion) of the city’s currency, according to an alert sent on its Bloomberg page yesterday in Asia, after it tested the upper end of its trading band. That added to the HK$56.1 billion of sales versus the greenback since Friday. The rapid intervention signals efforts from the city’s authorities to limit the local currency’s moves within its HK$7.75 to HK$7.85 per US dollar trading band. Heavy sales of the local dollar by
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co’s (TSMC, 台積電) revenue jumped 48 percent last month, underscoring how electronics firms scrambled to acquire essential components before global tariffs took effect. The main chipmaker for Apple Inc and Nvidia Corp reported monthly sales of NT$349.6 billion (US$11.6 billion). That compares with the average analysts’ estimate for a 38 percent rise in second-quarter revenue. US President Donald Trump’s trade war is prompting economists to retool GDP forecasts worldwide, casting doubt over the outlook for everything from iPhone demand to computing and datacenter construction. However, TSMC — a barometer for global tech spending given its central role in the
The Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC) yesterday met with some of the nation’s largest insurance companies as a skyrocketing New Taiwan dollar piles pressure on their hundreds of billions of dollars in US bond investments. The commission has asked some life insurance firms, among the biggest Asian holders of US debt, to discuss how the rapidly strengthening NT dollar has impacted their operations, people familiar with the matter said. The meeting took place as the NT dollar jumped as much as 5 percent yesterday, its biggest intraday gain in more than three decades. The local currency surged as exporters rushed to
PRESSURE EXPECTED: The appreciation of the NT dollar reflected expectations that Washington would press Taiwan to boost its currency against the US dollar, dealers said Taiwan’s export-oriented semiconductor and auto part manufacturers are expecting their margins to be affected by large foreign exchange losses as the New Taiwan dollar continued to appreciate sharply against the US dollar yesterday. Among major semiconductor manufacturers, ASE Technology Holding Co (日月光), the world’s largest integrated circuit (IC) packaging and testing services provider, said that whenever the NT dollar rises NT$1 against the greenback, its gross margin is cut by about 1.5 percent. The NT dollar traded as strong as NT$29.59 per US dollar before trimming gains to close NT$0.919, or 2.96 percent, higher at NT$30.145 yesterday in Taipei trading
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