President Chen Shui-bian (
President Chen, seeking re-election, made the remarks yesterday during visits to several temples in the Sungshan district to pray for a peaceful and properous new year. Yesterday was the fourth day of the first month of the Year of the Monkey, which traditionally is the day for Chinese to greet the arrival of the God of Fortune.
Chen, who started his political career by serving as a Taipei City councilman in the Sungshan and Hsinyi districts, asked for the continued support of his long-time followers in the March 20 presidential election.
Touting the performance of his government, Chen said that over the more than three years of his term, the nation's foreign exchange reserves have almost doubled from US$105 billion when he assumed office in May 2000 to US$206.6 billion at the end of last year.
Taiwan's businesses were adversely affected by the outbreaks of SARS in the second quarter of last year, the president noted, but the nation rebounded strongly in the third quarter to register economic growth of 4.18 percent. Fourth quarter growth stood at an even better 4.81 percent, the president said.
"I'm confident that economic growth this year will reach 5 percent, surpassing Singapore and Hong Kong," the president said.
Chen also said that the jobless rate in Taiwan dropped to 4.71 percent at the end of last year. This compares with 10 percent in Germany, 9.7 percent in France, 7.5 percent in Hong Kong and Canada, 5.9 percent in the US and Singapore, and 5.2 percent in Japan during the same period.
"I'm sure Taiwan's jobless rate could drop to 4.5 percent this year, and 4 percent next year," the president said.
Chen also said that the government has written off more than NT$1 trillion (US$29.67 billion) in bad debts over the past three years.
Non-performing loans of financial institutions have been reduced, and the structure of financial institutions has greatly improved, with the overall investment environment strengthening, he said.
The domestic unit of the Chinese-owned, Dutch-headquartered chipmaker Nexperia BV will soon be able to produce semiconductors locally within China, according to two company sources. Nexperia is at the center of a global tug-of-war over critical semiconductor technology, with a Dutch court in February ordering a probe into alleged mismanagement at the company. The geopolitical tussle has disrupted supply chains, with some carmakers reportedly forced to cut production due to chip shortages. Local production would allow Nexperia’s domestic arm, Nexperia Semiconductors (China) Ltd (安世半導體中國), to bypass restrictions in place since October on the supply of silicon wafers — etched with tiny components to
Taiwan’s foreign exchange reserves fell below the US$600 billion mark at the end of last month, with the central bank reporting a total of US$596.89 billion — a decline of US$8.6 billion from February — ending a three-month streak of increases. The central bank attributed the drop to a combination of factors such as outflows by foreign institutional investors, currency fluctuations and its own market interventions. “The large-scale outflows disrupted the balance of supply and demand in the foreign exchange market, prompting the central bank to intervene repeatedly by selling US dollars to stabilize the local currency,” Department of Foreign
Taiwan is open to joining a global liquefied natural gas (LNG) program if one is created, but on the condition that countries provide delivery even in a scenario where there is a conflict with China, an energy department official said yesterday. While Taiwan’s priority is to have enough LNG at home, the nation is open to exploring potential strategic reserves in other countries such as Japan or South Korea, Energy Administration Deputy Director-General Chen Chung-hsien (陳崇憲) said. While the LNG market does not have a global reserve for emergencies like that of oil, the concept has been raised a few times —
AI-FUELED DEMAND: The company has been benefiting from the skyrocketing prices for DRAM chips amid the AI frenzy, especially its core product — DDR4 DRAM chips DRAM chipmaker Nanya Technology Corp (南亞科技) yesterday reported that its revenue for the first quarter surged 582.91 percent to NT$49.09 billion (US$1.54 billion) from NT$7.19 billion a year earlier, as the supply crunch caused chip price spikes. Last quarter’s figure is the highest on record. On a quarterly basis, revenue jumped 63.14 percent from NT$30.09 billion, the company said. In January, Nanya Technology expected global DRAM supply scarcity to continue through the first half of 2028, thanks to strong demand for artificial intelligence (AI) applications. Market researcher TrendForce Corp (集邦科技) forecast prices of standard DRAM chips would rise between 58 percent and 63
RSS