Taiwan stocks barely rose on Tuesday, defying back-pedalling by US stocks, as investors shifted their focus to small-cap tech shares such as Wintek while taking profit in bellwether electronics. The TAIEX share index ended up 5.75 points, or 0.09 percent, at 6,416.34, coming within a hair's breadth of a 14-month high set last week.
Taiwan markets were closed on Monday due to a strong typhoon. Amid rising optimism over electronics demand in the second half of the year, many analysts say the index could begin another rally after only a few days of consolidation.
Wintek Corp, a maker of screens used in cellphones, jumped the daily maximum 7 percent to T$58.20, while telecommunications equipment maker Microelectronics Technology Inc also soared the daily limit to T$14.40.
Those gains helped the heavily weighted electronics sub-index rise 0.49 percent, even as larger peer AU Optronics Corp, the world's third-largest display screen maker, fell 1.4 percent to T$49.3.
AU has still gained 17 percent since the beginning of the year in anticipation of strong second half demand for cellphones, computers and flat screen televisions.
United Microelectronics Corp, the world's second-largest contract microchip maker, lost 1.43 percent to T$24.20. Profit-taking also hit some merger targets in the financial sector that had been attracting investor interest, while overall trading volume drifted lower to T$93.5 billion from the over T$100 billion averaged last week. Chang Hwa Bank finished the day's trading down 0.55 percent at T$17.95, and Taiwan Business Bank ended unchanged at T$10.65.
Nevertheless, the financial index, the second most heavily weighted sector, behind electronics, still gained 0.28 percent. The Dow Jones average slipped 0.62 percent and the technology-dominated Nasdaq dropped 0.55 percent, after the profits of Citigroup Inc, the world's largest financial services company, missed analysts' forecasts.