Taiwan stocks finished 0.26 percent higher on Wednesday as tech stocks rose after strong buying by foreign investors, but worries about bird flu erased some earlier gains.
The British government said on Tuesday a batch of birds imported from Taiwan could have had avian flu, but the Taiwan government dismissed the report as "highly suspicious" and said the birds were healthy when they left the island.
The benchmark TAIEX share index ended up 15.46 points at 6,046.20, off an intraday high of 6,079.30, after drifting into negative territory for most of the second half of the session.
"The news on bird flu sparked some fears among investors as there's still uncertainty about how quickly the virus will spread," said Tu Jing-lung, chairman of Grand Cathay Investment Services.
But he said strong trading volumes indicated more upside in the TAIEX, which he projected will rise to 6,500 points by the end of this year on more buying from foreign investors.
Market turnover rose to T$76.79 billion ($2.3 billion) from T$65.14 billion on Tuesday and T$70.3 billion on Monday.
The electronics sub-index rose 0.58 percent as domestic investors were cheered by strong buying by foreign investors in the run-up to the Christmas spending boom.
Foreign investors have purchased a net T$103.9 billion in Taiwan stocks in November, their biggest net purchase since the full month of June, when net buying totalled T$131.5 billion.
The 10 most active shares were all electronics companies. High Tech Computer Corp led the way with a 3.06 percent gain, Catcher Technology was up 2.65 percent and Mediatek Inc rose 0.79 percent.
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