1.   The buying supported prices of electric utilities, beverage, food and household products companies, as well as retailers.

2.   Technical buying supported the rally.

3.   Futures-related buying also supported the market, brokers said.

4.   However, institutional buying in particular supported a broad market lift, including modest gains in defensive stocks like banks, offsetting losses in resource stocks.

5.   In Tokyo, share prices were depressed by futures-linked selling but with institutional and public fund buying supporting the downside.

6.   Continued futures-linked buying supported the Nikkei indicator throughout the session, while foreign investors turned active buyers of a broad range of issues, brokers said.