While the nation's industrial web of cross-shareholdings continued unraveling, foreign investors were net buyers of Japanese stocks for the fifth consecutive week last week.

Nonresidents bought 79.47 billion yen more than they sold on the Tokyo, Osaka and Nagoya stock exchanges, on top of 71.3 billion yen the previous week, according to industry figures.

After having unwound their Japanese positions in the weeks immediately after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks in the U.S., foreign investors have adjusted their oversold positions.

As a major factor, brokerage officials cited the recent strong rebound in New York share prices.

The uptrend in New York stock prices gathered momentum in recent weeks, taking both the Dow Jones industrial average and the technology-heavy Nasdaq composite index back to levels before the terrorist attacks.

Foreign investors have opted for high-technology issues, reaffirming their confidence in so-called new economy shares.

For all of November, nonresidents turned net buyers for the first time in three months, chalking up 285.9 billion yen in net purchases.

Major domestic institutional investors, on the other hand, remained net sellers.

Although the Japanese markets also have surged overall in recent weeks, long-term credit, city and regional banks as a whole were net sellers for the ninth week in a row, with their net sales ballooning to 70.7 billion yen, compared with 25.4 billion yen the previous week.

Life and casualty insurance companies remained net sellers for the 10th consecutive week, selling 20.7 billion yen more than they bought, on top of net sales of 400 million yen the previous week.