Taiwanese shares closed little changed yesterday as late profit-taking capped earlier gains on a strong Wall Street overnight, dealers said.
The weighted index closed up 6.89 points, or 0.08 percent, at 8,745.35, nearly a two-week high, off an early peak of 8,809.33 on turnover of NT$104.68 billion (US$3.44 billion).
Gainers led decliners 1,186 to 1,143, with 406 stocks unchanged.
A total of 16 stocks closed limit-up and 15 were limit-down.
The tourism sector was up 4.71 percent on hopes of better cross-strait ties ahead of talks between the Straits Exchange Foundation and China’s Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait, dealers said.
The electronic sector was up 0.07 percent, while the cement sector was down 1.24 percent. Textiles were down 0.91 percent and financials fell 0.57 percent.
“As the trading volume still didn’t pick up, investors rather locked in profits first,” Fubon Securities (富邦證券) trader Edward Lien (連又賢) told Dow Jones Newswires.
Daniel Hsin (辛日祺), an analyst with Capital Securities Corp (群益證券), agreed and said investors tended to take profits, in particular after the market extended gains from Thursday’s 1.28 percent rise.
“As the market rose closer to 8,800 points, not many investors were willing to push share prices higher,” Hsin said.
Dealers said there were fears that rising inflation would impact on local economic fundamentals and that this weighed on market movements during the trade.
The market is expected to test 8,800 again in the next session were US shares to extend gains yesterday, they said.
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