At the close of trade yesterday, the NT dollar stood at NT$32.617 against the U.S. dollar, a rise of NT$0.127, on trade volume of US$478 million. The NT dollar had strengthened to NT$32.603 at one point during trading.

The NT dollar rose after the Thai baht led Asian currencies higher yesterday, as Bangkok scrapped penalties on overseas investors buying stocks, a day after imposing them.

The baht climbed to 35.81 per dollar at 4:30 p.m. in Bangkok yesterday, after falling as low as 36.08 Tuesday.

The Thai SET stock index jumped 10 percent yesterday, after sliding 15 percent Tuesday to the lowest since Oct. 29, 2004, wiping out US$23 billion of market value. Bonds joined stocks in the sell off, pushing up yields on the 10 year note 33 basis points to 5.2 percent.

The Malaysian ringgit rose 0.9 percent yesterday to 3.5450 and the South Korean won 0.6 percent to 925.80 per dollar.

In Taiwan, a weakened U.S. dollar and a rise of Taiwan’s local benchmark index TAIEX also caused the NT dollar to rise. The greenback weakened against the euro after Germany announced a surprise jump in its consumer confidence index.

Seeing a weakening U.S. dollar, exporters and foreign investors sold their U.S. dollar holdings, causing the NT dollar to rise even more.

The Bank of Thailand imposed its curbs after failing to halt an appreciation in the baht to the strongest in nine years. On Dec. 4, the bank asked companies and commercial lenders not to sell baht short-term debt to investors abroad.

Currencies from South Korea to the Philippines fell after Thailand imposed the curbs. Central banks across Asia have said in recent months that they are concerned about the effects of their strengthening currencies.

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