Taiwan stocks fell 0.81 percent on Wednesday with big tech exporters like hurt by weakness on Wall Street and amid concerns that an ongoing banking investigation could crimp reform. The main TAIEX share index ended down 57.53 points at 7,017.60.
Turnover remained soft at T$74.39 billion ($2.24 billion) ahead of the release of a slew of quarterly earnings from local technology companies."Corporate sales have just recovered so third-quarter profits probably won't be too exciting," said Kevin Line, a fund manager at Chinking Investment Trust.
Tech heavyweights in Taiwan report their earnings results by the end of the month.
The bellwether electronics sub-index fell 1.01 percent and the banking sub-index dropped 1.05 percent, amid an ongoing probe of Chinatrust Financials purchase of a stake in larger rival Meg Financial.
Chinatrust Financial shed 3.27 percent, while Megan Financial was up 0.43 percent. Hurt by losses in US peers, Hon Hai Precision Industry Co, the island's top maker of electronic parts, dropped 0.23 percent.
The world's biggest contract chipmaker, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co Ltd (TSMC) shed 1.43 percent, after chip giant Intel Corp posted a 35 percent fall in quarterly profit on Tuesday. Motorola Inc's falling quarterly profit also weighed on Taiwan suppliers, said Chiang Chen-sheng, manager at Masterlink Investment Advisory.