Taiwan to launch futures contracts for U.S, India benchmark indexes

TAIPEI (Reuters) - Taiwan will launch futures contracts for trading on the island of benchmark stock indices from the U.S. and India, a senior Taiwanese securities official said on Monday.

The Taiwan Futures Exchange is planning a futures contract for India's Nifty 50 by the end of this year at the earliest or the first half of 2017, Tsai Shih-chuan, vice president of the Taiwan Futures Exchange, told Reuters on the sidelines of an exchange event.

Tsai said the plans are to launch futures on the DJIA and S&P 500 at the end of 2017 at the earliest.

"The one for India will be faster...but the issue of time difference has to be resolved on (the contracts for) U.S. stocks," Tsai said.

The move is aimed at expanding Taiwan's futures market and attracting foreign investors, he said.

Last year, the island's futures exchange launched trading in Japan's TOPIX, so far the only foreign equity index futures traded in Taiwan.

(Reporting by Roger Tung; Writing by J.R. Wu; Editing by Sam Holmes)