The Taiwan weighted index closed virtually flat at 7842 on Tuesday. The index traded in a ~40 point range finally closing up 0.13%. In other asian market Shanghai Index closed at 3081 for a gain of 3.6%.

The French bank BNP Paribas SA pulled out of a three year joint venture with a Chinese securities firm. BNP Paribas transferred the companies share of Changjiang BNP Paribas Peregrine Securities Ltd. to China’s Changjiang Securities Co..

The list of debtors who owed more than 1 million NTD and has been unpaid for over a year have been published. The banks that disclosed debtors are The Chinese Bank (中華銀行), Taitung Business Bank(台東企銀) and the Enterprise Bank of Hualien (花蓮企銀). The debtors from three banks were released . One of the debtors, Chen You-Hou 陳由豪, is a fugitive that escaped to China.

The Swiss banking giant UBS AG is opening the first full service foreign brokerage firm in China. UBS AG has a with a full set of licenses to trade, underwrite securities, manage assets and publish research

In the US, we have another busy earnings week coming up. American Express Co., Ford Motor Co. and Microsoft Corp are all reporting.

Gas prices continue to fall in the US, having fell about US0.14 in the last two weeks. Oil futures have continued to fall, closing @ US$51.99 on friday, well below the record high of US$77.03 reached last summer.

The Taiwan weighted index opened 34 points down. The market rallied steadily and the Taiwan weighted index closed up half a percent at 7833.98, just 7.28 points off the high for the day.

The Rebar Group (力霸集團) scandal rolls on. Wang You-Theng (王又曾) borrowed 3,700萬 NTD ( US $1.1 Million ) from Idee 衣蝶 department stores before fleeing the country. The unnervingly close relationship between Asia Pacific Broadband Telecom Co (亞太固網) , which is part of the Rebar Group (力霸集團) , and the countries legislators, political parties and state controlled enterprises is coming to light. Several legislators and legislative aides had invested in bonds issued by the company.

Most Asian markets were higher on Tuesday, with Shanghai and Jakarta rising 0.94% and 1.34% respectivetly. The Nikkei was flat on speculation that the Bank of Japan could raise the overnight call rate target to 0.5 percent from 0.25.

The Rebar Group (力霸集團) scandal once again dominated the news. A a report from the cabinet that Wang You-Theng (王又曾) and his wife Wang Chin Shyh-Ying (王金世英) have fled to the US. The couple got on an airplane bound for San Francisco from Shanghai last Saturday.

The US markets were closed on Monday for the Martin Luther King holiday. Asian markets followed the US lead from Friday and traded higher. The US markets re-open on Tuesday, in the midst of the Q4 earnings season.

The Rebar scandal rolls on with stocks associated with the Rebar Group (力霸集團) trading lower. Members of the Rebar group such as Asia Pacific Broadband 亞太固網 are also being investigated along with companies that had investments such as Mega Bank 兆豐金 2882.TW, Taiwan Railroad 台鐵, and China Steel中鋼集團.

The Rebar Group’s (力霸集團) scandal continues to dominate the financial news on the island. On Saturday, a Ministry of Economic Affairs (MOEA) spokesman stated that then MOEA would lend a hand in investigating the Chinese bank scandal.

The construction , paper and motor vehicle sectors of the market were the hardest hit, with construction stocks falling 4%.

We have changed the format of the TSEC filings to make them more “search” friendly. In addition to that , we also changed the search engine to help find both TSEC filings and the front page articles for more relevant search results. Along with some other small changes, these will help make the site friendlier and easier to use..

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The filings list things such as share purchases and sales, meetings and the like. For now, TaoJ will only carry the filings for stocks that are on our coverage list.