Taiwan stocks rose in the final trading day before a seven-day holiday, led by Taiwan Semicon-ductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC,
TSMC's forecast of rising sales this year adds to growing optimism that chipmakers' earnings will recover as demand for semiconductors picks up, investors said.
The TAIEX, which has gained 45 percent in the past three months, yesterday rose 81.83, or 1.4 percent, to 5926.08.
Within the index, 353 stocks rose and 138 fell. The stock exchange will be closed from today through next Friday during the Lunar New Year holidays.
"Everyone's quite positive," said Aaron Wu, who manages NT$900 million (US$26 million) in stocks at Barits Securities Investment Trust Co (倍利投信). "People are buying now, betting the market will rise a lot after the new year holiday." The total value of trade was NT$138.9 billion (US$4 billion), 57 percent above the six-month daily average of NT$88.7 billion.
TSMC gained NT$1, or 1.2 percent, to NT$86.50 after the largest made-to-order chipmaker said it expects sales to rise as much as 30 percent this year as more customers farm out production to TSMC to cut costs.
Computer-memory-chip makers advanced after the price of the 128MB dynamic random access memory chip Tuesday gained 2.6 percent to US$3.62, the highest since May 10, according to DRAM Exchange.
Mosel Vitelic Inc (茂矽) rose 40 cents, or 2.1 percent, to NT$19.60. Powerchip Semiconductor Corp (力晶半導體) added NT$1.10, or 3.8 percent, to NT$30.40. ProMos Technologies Inc (茂德科技) rose NT$1.70 -- or 4.9 percent -- to NT$36.50. Ambit Microsystems Corp (國電) fell NT$3, or 1.8 percent, to NT$164 after it failed in a bid to supply Chunghwa Telecom Co (中華電信) with equipment that boosts the speed of data and voice communications rose.
Nanya Technology Corp (南亞科技) rose NT$2.50, or 5.1 percent, to NT$51.50. Taiwan's largest memory chipmaker by market value said sales in January almost tripled to NT$2.5 billion from a year earlier.
United Microelectronics Corp (UMC,
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