Taiwan stocks rose 0.6 percent on Thursday as gains on Wall Street supported technology exporters such as Hon Hai, largely ignoring a FTSE decision to hold Taiwan at advanced emerging market status. The main TAIEX share index had jumped as much as 2 percent by midday before late selling kicked in.
The TAIEX ended up 56.65 points at 8,983.03, continuing the previous session's 0.3 percent rebound from a two-week low. The exchange's turnover was active at T$151.55 billion ($4.6 billion), but down from T$171.26 billion on Wednesday.
"It seems the subprime market woes have eased somewhat after the US rate cut and foreign investors are buyers," said Kevin Lin, manager at Shinkong Investment Trust.
Topping the list of most active shares, Hon Hai Precision Industry Co, which makes computers for major US PC vendors, gained 3 percent. LCD maker AU Optronics Corp shot up 3.8 percent. Their gains lifted the electronics sub-index 0.6 percent higher. The financial sector was off 0.3 percent.
But investors used early rises to sell chip designer Mediatek Inc, whose share price fell 1.3 percent. Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co Ltd (TSMC), the world's top contract chip maker, dropped 0.7 percent.