Chunghwa Picture Tubes slashes its 2002 profit forecast

Chunghwa Picture Tubes Ltd (中華映管) slashed its profit forecast for this year, as Taiwan computer and chipmakers continue to pare expectations as their hopes for a revival in computer demand fade.

Taiwan's second-largest maker of flat-panel displays reduced its net income forecast by 70 percent to NT$3.3 billion (US$94 million). Chunghwa Picture Tubes, whose customers include Royal Philips Electronics NV, last week trimmed its sales forecast by more than a fifth to NT$40 billion.

Chunghwa Picture, Ritek Corp (錸德), Nanya Technology Corp (南亞科技) and other computer-parts makers have cut earnings expectations amid concern that a slowing recovery in the US, the nation's second-largest market, will impede an export-led rebound in Taiwan.

``No one at the start of the year expected US stocks to plunge so much or all the corporate problems, which is all hurting consumption,'' said Kelly Ko, who manages NT$1.7 billion in stocks at National Investment Trust Co. ``Any recovery in PC demand has been pushed back at least until the middle of next year.''

Any delay in the recovery leaves Taiwan in a lurch.

Taiwan is the world's largest maker of notebook computers, computer circuit boards and flat-panel displays, according to the state-run Market Intelligence Center (市場情報中心). Electronics and machines comprised more than half the island's exports in the first nine months of the year.

Chunghwa Picture Tubes sliced its profit forecast after flat-panel display prices fell by more than a fifth from July. The price of a flat panel that measures 15 inches diagonally has fallen to about US$200 from about US$265 in July.