Taiwan: Stocks rise to new 17-year highs, buoyed by Wall St

[TAIPEI] Taiwan stocks rose on Monday after reaching fresh highs not seen in 17 years by defying broader regional weakness to take the lead from records set on major Wall Street indexes.

As of 0340 GMT, the main Taiex index rose 0.4 per cent, to 10,198.83 points. Its session high so far of 10,210.37 is the index's best level since April 6, 2000, when it posted an intraday high of 10,328.98.

Taiwan stocks closed up 0.1 per cent in a special trading session on Saturday.

Taiwan's tech-heavy index tends to follow US tech shares and on Friday, the Dow Jones Industrial Average , the S&P 500 and the Nasdaq Composite all rose to record levels.

In Taiwan, the electronics subindex rose 0.7 per cent, while the financials subindex lost 0.1 per cent.

The Taiwan dollar firmed NT$0.039 to NT$30.088 per US dollar.

REUTERS