US stock markets ended mixed on Friday with the leading Dow Jones Industrial Average higher for a fourth straight trading day as investors set their sights on lower interest rates.
The Dow held its gains following a speech by Federal Reserve chairman Ben Bernanke late on Thursday in which the central bank chief warned that strains in the financial markets may lead to broader economic problems.
Wall Street read that as meaning fresh interest rate cuts are imminent.
The Dow stock barometer finished up 59.99 points (0.45 percent) at a close of 13,371.72, but off earlier highs which had seen the index soar by over 100 points.
Technology stocks lost momentum as the NASDAQ composite fell 7.17 points (0.27 percent) to 2,660.96. The broad-market Standard & Poor's 500 index gained 11.42 points (0.78 percent) to a close of 1,481.14.
Analysts said the Fed is expected to cut rates again on Dec. 11 following back-to-back rate cuts in September and October amid a lingering housing meltdown, tightening credit markets and rising energy costs.
"Bernanke yesterday did seem to be indicating his personal belief that rate cuts are necessary," said Dick Green, a market analyst at Briefing.com.
The central bank's short-term Fed funds rate is currently pegged at 4.5 percent.
"Financial shares were higher on speculation the government will cut borrowing costs and negotiate a deal with banks to fix interest rates on sub-prime mortgages," said Al Goldman, a chief market strategist at AG Edwards.
Financial stocks have been plagued by mounting losses tied to subprime mortgages which were granted to people with poor credit before the housing market entered a slump last year.
Citigroup's stock closed up 3.1 percent at US$33.30 while Merrill Lynch finished 4.4 percent higher at US$59.94.
On the economic front, the government announced that consumer spending edged higher last month, by 0.2 percent, but the gain was weaker than most economists had expected.
Economists fear that the housing meltdown and other economic concerns might force consumers to cut back spending amid the crucial pre-Christmas shopping season.
"It seems that the US consumer is starting to show some signs of fatigue in October, as the credit troubles, high oil prices, and weak dollar all begin to take their toll," said Charmaine Buskas, senior economic strategist at TD Securities.
Motorola's share price finished up 2 percent at US$15.97 after the US mobile phone maker said its embattled chief executive Ed Zander was stepping down.
The phone maker named Greg Brown, 47, the company's president and chief operating officer, as its new CEO, although the job switch will not take effect until Jan. 1.
The management reshuffle comes as Motorola vies to keep its market share amid aggressive competition from Nokia and Samsung.
Shares in online broker ETrade ended down 4.5 percent at US$4.60 a day after it announced it was getting a US$2.5-billion cash infusion from a big hedge fund to help shore up its ailing balance sheet.
Bond prices weakened as the yield on the 10-year US Treasury bond rose to 3.972 percent from 3.940 percent on Thursday and that on the 30-year bond increased to 4.403 percent from 4.349 percent. Bond yields and prices move in opposite directions.
Six Taiwanese companies, including contract chipmaker Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC), made the 2025 Fortune Global 500 list of the world’s largest firms by revenue. In a report published by New York-based Fortune magazine on Tuesday, Hon Hai Precision Industry Co. (better known as Foxconn) ranked highest among Taiwanese firms, placing 28th with revenue of US$213.69 billion. Up 60 spots from last year, TSMC rose 60 places to reach No. 126 with US$90.16 billion in revenue, followed by Quanta Computer Inc. at 348th, Pegatron Corp. at 461st, CPC Corp., Taiwan at 494th and Wistron Corp. at 496th. According to Fortune, the world’s
NEW PRODUCTS: MediaTek plans to roll out new products this quarter, including a flagship mobile phone chip and a GB10 chip that it is codeveloping with Nvidia Corp MediaTek Inc (聯發科) yesterday projected that revenue this quarter would dip by 7 to 13 percent to between NT$130.1 billion and NT$140 billion (US$4.38 billion and US$4.71 billion), compared with NT$150.37 billion last quarter, which it attributed to subdued front-loading demand and unfavorable foreign exchange rates. The Hsinchu-based chip designer said that the forecast factored in the negative effects of an estimated 6 percent appreciation of the New Taiwan dollar against the greenback. “As some demand has been pulled into the first half of the year and resulted in a different quarterly pattern, we expect the third quarter revenue to decline sequentially,”
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DIVERSIFYING: Taiwanese investors are reassessing their preference for US dollar assets and moving toward Europe amid a global shift away from the greenback Taiwanese investors are reassessing their long-held preference for US-dollar assets, shifting their bets to Europe in the latest move by global investors away from the greenback. Taiwanese funds holding European assets have seen an influx of investments recently, pushing their combined value to NT$13.7 billion (US$461 million) as of the end of last month, the highest since 2019, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Over the first half of this year, Taiwanese investors have also poured NT$14.1 billion into Europe-focused funds based overseas, bringing total assets up to NT$134.8 billion, according to data from the Securities Investment Trust and Consulting Association (SITCA),
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