The Cabinet yesterday said it will suspend a proposed sale of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC,
"[TSMC Chairman Morris Chang (張忠謀)] told me that it is not good timing for the sale," Premier Yu Shyi-kun said after he met with Chang yesterday morning.
"The proposed share sale may hurt TSMC's share prices and harm investor confidence in the stock market," he added.
Yu met with Chang yesterday at a breakfast meeting held by the Chinese National Association of Industry and Commerce in Taipei.
Shares of TSMC lost NT$1.9 to close at NT$40.9 yesterday on the TAIEX. Since the beginning of the month, TSMC shares have tumbled 11 percent on fears of a slowdown in global electronics demand and growing inventories, despite the company's solid financial reports.
According to a budget plan proposed by the management committee of the Development Fund (
The Development Fund, which owns a 7.4 percent stake in the world's largest made-to-order chipmaker, said the planned sale is estimated to bring in NT$40 billion for the national coffer. After the sale, the fund's holdings in TSMC will drop to 4.6 percent, or 900 million shares.
Hu Sheng-cheng (
However, other companies that the fund holds shares with are not as lucky as TSMC. According to the fund's budget for this year, the fund will sell 48 million shares in Powerchip Semiconductor Corp (
Hu said that the Cabinet will sell shares of these companies in accordance with the budget project. Hu added that the Cabinet will soon hold meetings to discuss how to fill the NT$40 billion budget shortfall since the fund has decided to halt the sale of TSMC shares.
For the first half of the year, TSMC reported sales revenue of NT$122.38 billion, up by 37.1 percent from the same period last year.
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