Taiwan dollar gains on stocks ahead of U.S. data

* Taiwan dollar at strongest closing price since Oct. 28

* Stock markaet gains as foreign funds buy Taiwan shares

* Taiwan central bank buys U.S. dollars in final minutes (Updates to close)

TAIPEI, Nov 6 - The Taiwan dollar <TWD=TP> firmed for a third session on Friday to a seven-day closing high, tracking stocks and global U.S. dollar weakness ahead of jobs data, but the central bank moved to curb gains, dealers said.

The final price of T$32.509 was the currency's strongest close since Oct. 28.

"The U.S. dollar has gone lower as the market was cautious about tonight's (U.S. jobless) figure," a dealer in Taipei said. "The central bank was also trying to stabilise the price."

The greenback has fallen this week after the Federal Reserve kept interest rates at record lows and signaled they were likely to stay there for some time to come. [ID:nN05137603]

Investors stayed on the sidelines on Friday ahead of U.S. jobless data, which if positive would signal broad economic improvement and raise the appeal of higher risk currencies such as the Taiwan dollar.

Supporting the local currency, foreign institutions were net buyers of Taiwan shares on Friday for the first time this month, grabbing T$4.549 billion ($140 million) in shares as the stock market <.TWII> closed 0.61 percent higher.

But the island's monetary authority, which keeps the Taiwan dollar in a managed float and has sought recently to keep it soft to help recession-strapped local exporters, bought U.S. dollars in late trade to pare earlier gains, dealers said.

In the non-deliverable forwards market, six-month NDFs were quoted at -0.720/-0.700, compared with Thursday's -0.680/-0.630. That indicated the market was expecting the Taiwan dollar to strengthen by a larger degree in half a year.

0800 GMT PREVIOUS SESSION T$ (Taipei Forex Inc) 32.509 32.558 Volume in $ mln (Taipei Forex Inc) 593 565 T$ (Cosmos) 32.495 32.535 Six-month NDFs <PNDF> -0.720/-0.700 -0.680/-0.630 Note: Taipei Forex Inc is Taiwan's main forex exchange; Cosmos is a smaller exchange. Both exchanges end trading at 0800 GMT Source: NDFs quotations from Prebon Asia For more foreign exchange news, please click [nTOPFRX]