Taiwan stocks rise

Taiwan stocks rose on Thursday as technology shares gained on optimism over export orders in March that offered some hope of a pickup in demand, and tracking overseas markets. The main TAIEX index rose 0.3 percent to 8,543.56 as of 0409 GMT, after closing down 1.4 percent in the previous session.
The electronics subindex rose 0.7 percent, while the financials subindex lost 0.1 percent.
Taiwan's export orders, which are dominated by demand for tech-related components, fell for the 12th month in a row in March.
Big-cap contract chipmaker TSMC was up 1.6 percent and electronics manufacturer Hon Hai was also up over 1 percent. The Taiwan dollar softened T$0.031 to T$32.279 per US dollar.