Although Hon Hai Precision (鴻海精密) has made a lot of progress in working conditions at its Chinese factories, the company still faces a challenge in trying to meet a July 1 deadline for cutting working hours.

Shares in Taiwan pulled back Friday from the gains of the previous session as the market encountered stiff technical resistance ahead of 8,400 points, dealers said.

TECO Electric and Machinery (TECO,東元電機) is set to issue Taiwan's second renminbi-denominated bond from corporate issuer GreTai (over the counter market, 櫃買中心) next Monday with the help of HSBC Taipei.

Shares of Shin Kong Financial Holding Co. moved higher Friday morning after it reported an improvement in its bottom line for the first quarter of this year, dealers said.

The chairwoman of Taiwan-based smartphone vendor HTC Corp. has not raised her holdings in the company for 10 months, statistics released by the Taiwan Stock Exchange (TWSE) showed Friday.

The U.S. dollar rose against the New Taiwan dollar Friday, gaining NT$0.01 to close at NT$30.060 as the local central bank entered the trading floor again to prop up the greenback and help the currency reverse its early gains, dealers said.

Shares in Taiwan closed higher on expanded turnover yesterday as investors had high hopes that the government will revise the capital gains tax on stock investments by exempting retailer investors from the levy, dealers said.

Shares for Vanguard International Semiconductor Co. (世界先進) and Mediatek (聯發科) got a boost yesterday after positive adjustments were made to both stocks in the Taiwan index of the MSCI Global Standard Indices (MSCI Taiwan), dealers said.

MSCI Inc., a global index provider, has cut Taiwan's weighting in its Asia-Pacific index (excluding Japan) and in its emerging markets index after a semi-annual index review.

Taiwan's Asustek Computer Inc. lost its ranking among the top five PC makers in Western Europe in the first quarter because of weak buying, research company Gartner Inc. said.