Taiwan stocks rose 0.15 percent on Friday as financial shares led a rebound from a two-week low, while investors took advantage of fresh gains on Wall Street to pocket profits from tech issues like UMC.
The mains TAIEX share index closed up 8.96 points at 5,969.07, following six straight sessions of declines.
Despite the day's comeback, the index lost 1.9 percent this week. Turnover remained thin on Friday at T$59.56 billion ($1.78 billion), down from T$69.76 billion in the last session.
"Retail investors did not dare to buy financial shares when they have little confidence in the government's financial reforms, so the buying must be from state funds," said Chiang Chen-sheng, manager at MasterLink Investment Advisory.
State buying was aimed at boosting investors' confidence following recent slump, he said. Financials gained 1.15 percent on Friday's session but they had fallen 9.5 percent since late July.
Taiwan Business Bank, the market's most active issue, surged the daily 7 percent limit at T$8.66 and Chinatrust Financial Holding rose 2.71 percent to T$28.40.
On a sour note, United Microelectronics Corp (UMC) gave up rises to end down 0.5 percent, pulling the bellwether electronics sub-index 0.35 percent lower.
Display screen maker AU Optronics Corp fell 0.39 percent to T$38.20, even after larger rival Samsung Electronics Co Ltd posted quarterly earnings in line with analysts' forecasts.
The South Korean Company expected a sequential rise in sales and profits in the fourth quarter. AU shares have been weak since South Korea's LG.Philips LCD Co Ltd gave this week a gloomy pricing outlook for the fourth quarter.
Smaller local rival Chi Mie Optoelectronics Corp fell 0.44 percent to T$34.05 and Chunghwa Picture Tubes Ltd was off 2.99 percent at T$8.12. Despite the two Korean companies giving a mixed view for the fourth quarter, analysts remained concerned about a return of oversupply of panels next year.
Shares of suppliers of Apple Computer Inc's popular pod were among other major winners as investors were betting on strong consumer demand in the run up to the year-end holidays.
For example, Cheng Uei Precision Industry Co Ltd, which supplies connectors to Apple, jumped 0.73 percent to T$96.00. Apple shares surged 9.1 percent on Thursday after unveiling a pod that plays video and surprised Wall Street by announcing a television distribution deal with Disney Co.
The rebound came two days after its quarterly revenue fell short of market expectations. The over-the-counter market's TAISDAQ indexes edged up 0.14 percent to 112.74, while October TAIEX index futures lost 0.28 percent to 5,968.
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