Stocks gained yesterday as AU Optronics Corp (友達光電) and Chi Mei Optoelectronics Corp (奇美電子) surged by their daily limits on optimism prices of flat-panel displays may rise because of a shortage of parts to make the screens.
The TAIEX barely rose, adding 3.67 points to 5,750.81. Eight stocks fell for every Seven that gained. The futures contract for September delivery rose 0.03 percent to 5,759.
About 3.5 billion shares changed hands, or 25 percent below the average volume in the past three months. Shares worth NT$81.1 billion (US$2.4 billion) were traded.
AU Optronics, the world's No. 3 maker of flat-panel displays for
personal computers, rose NT$3.10, or 6.9 percent, to NT$48.20. Chi Mei, the country's second largest LCD display maker, rose NT$3.10, or 6.9 percent, to NT$47.80.
Quanta Display Inc (
Teco Electric & Machinery Co (東元電機), which markets flat-panel televisions under its own brand, expects to sell 720,000 liquid-display-panel televisions next year after selling 100,000 units this year, a Chinese-language newspaper reported, citing company president Lin Sheng-chuan (林勝泉).
"The LCD industry is booming because more and more people are buying LCD TVs to replace bulky cathode ray tube TVs," Phil Chen, who manages the US$46 million High-Tech Fund at Grand Cathay Securities Investment Trust Co (
Formosa Plastics Corp (台塑) fell NT$0.60, or 1.2 percent, to NT$48.50 after a Chinese-language newspaper reported Chinese Petroleum Corp (中油) will raise the price of acrylonitrile, which is used in feedstock, starting next year.
The new price will increase costs of feedstock for Chinese Petroleum clients such as Formosa Plastics by about 15 percent from the current level, the report said, citing the company's chief executive officer.
Evergreen Marine Corp (
Mega Financial Holdings Co (
Mega Financial is offering US$600 million of bonds convertible into its shares, a sale document sent to investors shows, to pay loans and fund investments. The two-year bonds will be convertible into the company's shares at NT$21.08 a share, the document shows. That's a 23 percent premium to Wednesday's close of NT$17.2.
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”
TRANSFORMATION: Taiwan is now home to the largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, thanks to the nation’s economic policies President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday attended an event marking the opening of Google’s second hardware research and development (R&D) office in Taiwan, which was held at New Taipei City’s Banciao District (板橋). This signals Taiwan’s transformation into the world’s largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, validating the nation’s economic policy in the past eight years, she said. The “five plus two” innovative industries policy, “six core strategic industries” initiative and infrastructure projects have grown the national industry and established resilient supply chains that withstood the COVID-19 pandemic, Tsai said. Taiwan has improved investment conditions of the domestic economy
Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 0.7 percent and 13.6 percent respectively from a year earlier, setting record highs for the month of March, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Sales in the wholesale sector also grew last month by 4.6 annually, mainly due to the business opportunities for emerging applications related to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing technologies, the ministry said in a report. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales this month would retain their growth momentum as the former would benefit from Tomb Sweeping Day