The Taiwan stock market emphatically ended the two-day winning streak in which it had advanced almost 400 points or 2 percent. The Taiwan Stock Exchange now sits just above the 19,525-point plateau and it may take further damage on Monday.
The global forecast for the Asian markets in negative, with continued pressure likely on the technology shares. The European markets were down and the U.S. bourses were mixed and the Asian markets figure to split the difference.
The TSE finished sharply lower on Friday with damage across the board, especially among the technology stocks and financial shares.
For the day, the index plummeted 774.08 points or 3.81 percent to finish at 19,527.12 after trading between 19,291.88 and 19,992.06.
Among the actives, Cathay Financial retreated 2.06 percent, while Mega Financial lost 1.28 percent, CTBC Financial declined 2.21 percent, First Financial slid 0.93 percent, Fubon Financial stumbled 1.96 percent, E Sun Financial slumped1.67 percent, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company plunged 6.72 percent, United Microelectronics Corporation shed 2.19 percent, Hon Hai Precision dropped 3.38 percent, Largan Precision tumbled 3.64 percent, Catcher Technology fell 0.48 percent, MediaTek plunged 5.43 percent, Delta Electronics tanked 3.40 percent, Novatek Microelectronics surrendered 4.39 percent, Formosa Plastics sank 1.47 percent, Nan Ya Plastics decreased 1.43 percent, Asia Cement was down 0.36 percent, Taiwan Cement weakened 2.21 percent and China Steel skidded 1.41 percent.
The lead from Wall Street is conflicted as the Dow opened higher on Friday and stayed that way, while the S&P and NASDAQ spent the entire session under water.
The Dow rallied 211.00 points or 0.56 percent to finish at 37,986.40, while the NASDAQ tumbled 319.49 points or 2.05 percent to end at 15,282.01 and the S&P 500 sank 43.89 points or 0.88 percent to close at 4,967.23.
For the week, the NASDAQ plummeted 5.5 percent, the S&P tumbled 3.1 percent and the Dow rose 0.1 percent.
The steep drop by the NASDAQ reflected heavy selling among shares of Netflix (NFLX) and AI darling Nvidia (NVDA). Reflecting the weakness in the sector, the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index dove by 4.1 percent to its lowest closing level since early February.
Banking stocks turned in a strong performance, driving the KBW Bank Index up by 2.9 percent. Interest rate-sensitive utilities stocks also moved notably higher amid a pullback by treasury yields, resulting in a 1.8 percent jump by the Dow Jones Utility Average.
Oil prices moved higher on Friday as geopolitical tensions rose following Israel's retaliatory attack on Iran. West Texas Intermediate Crude oil futures for May ended higher by $0.41 at $83.14 a barrel, although WTI crude futures shed about 3 percent in the week.
Closer to home, Taiwan will see March numbers for export orders and unemployment later today; in February, export orders dropped 10.4 percent on year, while the jobless rate came in at 3.4 percent.
Market Analysis