Asian stocks shrugged off a mixed performance by Wall Street on Friday, ending the week with further gains and benchmarks at historical peaks or multi-year highs.
Taipei and Seoul were among the best on the day, with both markets gaining more than one percent on strong buying by foreign investors.
Tokyo made slight gains and again closed at its highest level since mid-2000 and its performance was mirrored elsewhere in the region. Sydney and Wellington closed at record highs. Singapore finished at a six-year high, while Manila and Shanghai also gained.
Bangkok rose modestly ahead of Sunday's elections, however profit taking pushed Mumbai off its record peak, Hong Kong eased and Kuala Lumpur was flat ahead of the government's release of a five year spending plan.
Markets in Jakarta were closed for a public holiday.
Taipei share prices closed 1.04 percent higher after an as-expected interest rate hike and as technology stocks forged ahead further in line with sustained gains on NASDAQ.
Dealers said foreign investors were back in evidence, looking at large-cap stocks, particularly heavyweight semiconductor shares.
The weighted index rose 67.91 points at 6,613.97 on turnover of NT$110.42 billion (US$3.40 billion).
SinoPac Securities Corp (建華證券) assistant vice president Alvin Teng (鄧可欣) said that local technology stocks rose in line with the gains made by their US counterparts.
Anticipation of month-on-month growth in corporate sales for last month also boosted sentiment, Teng said.
"Liquidity returned to the stock market; investors seemed to be more optimistic [about the bourse] now," he added.
Tokyo
Tokyo share prices eked out small gains in late trade to close at their highest level for over five years after data showed further signs of a recovery in the economy.
Dealers said the market managed to recover from an early bout of profit-taking to extend its winning streak to six trading days, with sentiment buoyed by a drop in unemployment to a seven-year low and a further easing of deflation.
The NIKKEI-225 index rose 14.32 points or 0.08 percent to 17,059.66, the highest closing level since August 2000. Volume dropped to 1.66 billion shares from 2.22 billion shares on Thursday.
Investors welcomed news on Friday that Japan's unemployment rate fell to a seven-year low of 4.1 percent in February from 4.5 percent in January.
"The unemployment data confirmed the recovery of the Japanese economy," said Hideyuki Suzuki, a strategist at SBI Securities.
Japan's core consumer price index (CPI) gained 0.5 percent in February from a year earlier, a fourth consecutive monthly rise.
Seoul share prices closed 1.6 percent higher, with investors shrugging off Wall Street's mixed performance.
Dealers said strong program buying and foreign investor support offset massive profit-taking by retail investors, leading the index to rise for a seventh trading session.
The KOSPI index closed up 21.46 points at 1,359.60.
Hong Kong share prices closed 0.48 percent lower, giving up early gains as profit-taking in China Mobile intensified in late trade.
The Hang Seng index lost 75.65 points at 15,805.04.
"Heavy profit-taking in China Mobile led to the market's fall. Other blue chips were also lower as some investors locked in profits after recent rises," said Castor Pang, strategist at Sun Hung Kai Financial group.
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