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Singapore’s property boom finally cooling: analysts

Shares rise on cautious trade

Share prices closed 1.56 percent higher yesterday on bargain hunting after recent heavy losses, but thin trading volume indicated caution amid inflation fears, dealers said.

The weighted index rose 112.7 points to 7,341.11, off a low of 7,179.24 and a high of 7,343.63, on turnover of NT$73.88 billion (US$2.43 billion).

Following a fall of more than 16 percent since the end of May, most stocks looked attractive in valuations, with market heavyweights such as financials, cements and petrochemicals in focus, dealers said.

“Valuations after recent steep declines were not able to reflect profitability of these large cap stocks. They seemed to have been oversold,” Mega Securities (兆豐證券) analyst Alex Huang (黃國偉) said.

Huang said he suspected buying came largely from major shareholders of these leading stocks to boost investor confidence amid market turbulence at home and abroad. A trader with a foreign brokerage said that government-controlled funds also played a role behind the gains.

However, Huang said daily turnover was low, indicating many investors remained sidelined because of concern over rising oil prices.

“They are watching closely when foreign institutional investors will resume buying after the massive selling,” he said.

New models boost HTC profit

High Tech Computer Corp (HTC, 宏達電), the world’s largest maker of handsets using Microsoft Corp’s Windows operating system, posted a 7 percent increase in second-quarter profit after releasing new models.

Its net income climbed to NT$6.44 billion (US$212 million), or NT$8.52 a share, from NT$6 billion, or NT$10.43, a year earlier, the Taoyuan-based company said in an e-mailed statement yesterday. HTC was expected to post a profit of NT$6.5 billion, according to the average of nine analysts’ estimates compiled by Bloomberg.

CAL chairman resigns

China Airlines (CAL, 中華航空) chairman Ringo Chao (趙國帥) tendered his resignation yesterday.

Sources say that Chao wrote in the letter he intended to terminate his responsibilities at the airline with immediate effect.

Company spokesman Bruce Chen (陳鵬宇) said it was Chao’s personal decision to resign.

“Chao feels that he has completed his duties with the initiation of cross-strait charter flights. This was the goal he set for himself at China Airlines. And at the completion of this task, he feels that it is time for him to leave,” Chen said.

Envoy hopes for direct flights

Taiwanese authorities are hoping to see the start of direct flights between Taiwan and Israel to meet the growing demand driven by an increasing number of visitors and expanded business activities, Taiwanese Representative to Israel Terry Ting (丁干城) said on Sunday.

Ting said Taiwanese had made more than 6,000 visits to Israel during the first half of this year, up 118 percent from a year ago.

Meanwhile, Israelis made more than 2,000 visits to Taiwan during the same period, Ting said, adding that the total number of bilateral visits could exceed 10,000 by the end of this year.

Economic exchanges between the two countries have also expanded in recent years, with bilateral trade reaching US$1.3 billion in 2006, increasing to US$1.3 billion last year and projected to rise to US$1.4 billion next year, Ting said.

NT dollar gains ground

The New Taiwan dollar gained NT$0.002 to close at NT$30.399 against the US dollar on turnover of US$856 million yesterday.


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