Chinese Finance Minister Xiang Huaicheng (
Xiang, emerging from a bilateral meeting on the sidelines of a meeting of Asia-Pacific finance ministers, was peppered with questions from reporters on cross-Strait trade.
PHOTO: AFP
Xiang replied: "You said, `Can Taiwan banks set up branches in China?' I say yes. You said, `Three links?' I say yes."
Asked under what circumstances, he raised a single finger and said: "One China."
Xiang had earlier met Taiwan Finance Minister Yen Ching-Cheng (顏慶章) in what both described as "friendly talks," but they did not touch upon Taiwan's calls for dropping a decades-old ban on direct trade links at its recent Economic Development Advisory Conference.
The meeting -- marking the highest level talks between the two political rivals since Taipei last month called for lifting the ban on direct links -- focused instead on Asia's slumping economies and preparations for a weekend meeting of Asia-Pacific finance ministers in the Chinese city of Suzhou.
"We had very good talks," China's Xiang Huaicheng told reporters after the meeting. "We have many views in common."
Yen said the meeting also did not address Credit Suisse First Boston, which China dropped from a lucrative underwriting deal after the US investment bank helped organize road shows for Taiwan officials, including Yen.
"We spoke within the scope of the APEC finance ministers' meeting," Yen told reporters.
A key Taiwan advisory panel recommended on Aug. 26 that Taipei hold talks with Beijing on opening the "three links" -- direct trade, transport and postal ties -- within the framework of the WTO.
In Taipei, the government -- in its harshest criticism of China in recent months -- accused Beijing of trying to "hollow out" the Taiwanese economy and of attempting to suffocate the nation on the world stage.
The angry words follow reports that China penalized investment bank Credit Suisse First Boston for inviting Taiwan's finance minister to conferences in Hong Kong and Europe. The meetings were designed to help Taiwan attract foreign investment.
Beijing's move has Taiwanese worried that China has added Taiwan's business ties to its list of targets in a campaign to isolate Taiwan from the rest of the world.
Yesterday in Taipei one of Taiwan's top officials responsible for China policy criticized Beijing's actions against Credit Suisse.
"The Chinese communists are scheming against us more severely by the day," said Lin Chong-pin (
On the surface, Lin said, China has taken a soft approach by inviting Taiwanese opposition politicians and others to visit China.
But in fact, he said, China has pursued a policy of "suffocating us on the diplomatic front, suppressing us on the political front, hollowing out our economy, waging a battle for reunification socially and intimidating us militarily."
BUSINESS UPDATE: The iPhone assembler said operations outlook is expected to show quarter-on-quarter and year-on-year growth for the second quarter Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) yesterday reported strong growth in sales last month, potentially raising expectations for iPhone sales while artificial intelligence (AI)-related business booms. The company, which assembles the majority of Apple Inc’s smartphones, reported a 19.03 percent rise in monthly sales to NT$510.9 billion (US$15.78 billion), from NT$429.22 billion in the same period last year. On a monthly basis, sales rose 14.16 percent, it said. The company in a statement said that last month’s revenue was a record-breaking April performance. Hon Hai, known also as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團), assembles most iPhones, but the company is diversifying its business to
Apple Inc has been developing a homegrown chip to run artificial intelligence (AI) tools in data centers, although it is unclear if the semiconductor would ever be deployed, the Wall Street Journal reported on Monday. The effort would build on Apple’s previous efforts to make in-house chips, which run in its iPhones, Macs and other devices, according to the Journal, which cited unidentified people familiar with the matter. The server project is code-named ACDC (Apple Chips in Data Center) within the company, aiming to utilize Apple’s expertise in chip design for the company’s server infrastructure, the newspaper said. While this initiative has been
GlobalWafers Co (環球晶圓), the world’s No. 3 silicon wafer supplier, yesterday said that revenue would rise moderately in the second half of this year, driven primarily by robust demand for advanced wafers used in high-bandwidth memory (HBM) chips, a key component of artificial intelligence (AI) technology. “The first quarter is the lowest point of this cycle. The second half will be better than the first for the whole semiconductor industry and for GlobalWafers,” chairwoman Doris Hsu (徐秀蘭) said during an online investors’ conference. “HBM would definitely be the key growth driver in the second half,” Hsu said. “That is our big hope
The consumer price index (CPI) last month eased to 1.95 percent, below the central bank’s 2 percent target, as food and entertainment cost increases decelerated, helped by stable egg prices, the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) said yesterday. The slowdown bucked predictions by policymakers and academics that inflationary pressures would build up following double-digit electricity rate hikes on April 1. “The latest CPI data came after the cost of eating out and rent grew moderately amid mixed international raw material prices,” DGBAS official Tsao Chih-hung (曹志弘) told a news conference in Taipei. The central bank in March raised interest rates by