Asian shares mixed; euro wins respite

TOKYO (Reuters) - Asian shares broadly rose on Tuesday, led by Taiwan and South Korea, and the euro staged a small rebound from its recent drubbing, but Japan and Australia fell as investor sentiment remained weak on euro zone fiscal concerns.

Share markets in Britain , France and Germany were forecast to open as much as 1 percent down, tracking losses on Wall Street on Monday, where the Dow Jones industrial average ended below 10,000 points.

"There's a lot of concerns out there -- the euro zone issues, the chance of limits on U.S. bank risk taking, and worries about Chinese credit tightening," said Norihiro Fujito, general manager at Mitsubishi UFJ Securities.

The MSCI index of Asian shares outside Japan rose 0.4 percent, with IT stocks leading, after an early dip to a five-month low, while shares in Hong Kong held slender gains and Shanghai stocks slipped in and out of the red.

Analysts said confidence was still flimsy with worries about fiscal problems in Greece, Spain and Portugal likely to limit the scope of any rebounds, and financial shares trailed other sectors after banks led financials lower on Wall Street.

Shares in Seoul rose 1.1 percent , with the KOSPI bouncing from a two-month low to above 1,550 points helped by gains in tech shares such as Samsung Electronics <005930.KS>.

Shanghai stocks closed nearly half a percent higher with financial shares mostly firmer although a new listing by China First Heavy Industries <601106.SS> continued a string of disappointing market debuts while turnover shrank to an 11-month low.

Taiwan stocks closed 2 percent up , their biggest jump since September, with government funds said to have bought shares, and strong export data boosting tech exporters such as TSMC , the world's largest contract chipmaker.

But it was a different story in Japan, where the Nikkei slid 0.2 percent to a two-month closing low, after breaking down through 10,000 points on Monday, as euro zone sovereign debt woes gnawed at investor confidence.

Beaten-down Toyota Motor <7203.T> shares climbed on short-covering as it said it would recall nearly half a million of its flagship Prius and other hybrid cars for braking problems, and Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group <8316.T> rose after posting its biggest profit in seven quarters.