To reduce risks for investors, the government will strengthen the screening process for companies applying to be listed on the stock market, and improve the transparency of listed companies, a government official said yesterday.
"We will be more cautious in inspecting the qualification of companies that apply to raise funds in the market in the future," said Lee Yung-san (
PHOTO: GEORGE TSORNG, TAIPEI TIMES
The exhibition, housing 220 booths, started yesterday at the Taipei World Trade Center Exhibition Hall III. The show is open from 10am to 6pm and runs until Sunday. Admission is free
According to government figures, there are 460 companies listed on the Gretai Securities Market, and 337 on the Emerging Stock Market.
Electronics Downturn
Lee said that, by and large, listed companies' performance this year has not been bad. The downturn in the electronics industry, however, has meant some share prices have tumbled to single-digit values, causing panic among investors.
Another concern for the market has been poor corporate governance among public companies. Several major financial scandals have been uncovered in larger companies listed on the Taiwan Stock Exchange this year, such as those involving Procomp Informatics Co (博達科技) and Summit Computer Technology (皇統科技).
Confidence
To regain investor confidence, the regulator will hold more events such as the exhibition and investor conferences for prospective investors to get more company information, Lee said.
To encourage investor interest, the GRETAI Securities Market, the organizer of the exhibition, will hold an investment contest in futures and options from Jan. 2 to Mar. 31. Participants are required to deposit at least NT$100,000 in an account and operate in the real market.
The winner will be those contestants reporting the highest yield in the designated period. The top prize is NT$1 million.
PC Home
One noticeable exhibitor at the show is PC Home Online (
The company is scheduled to debut on the over-the-counter market on Jan. 24. It has offered 3.6 million shares through a four-day online auction with a floor price of NT$21.9 per share. The bidding will close today.
Vicky Tseng (
"The response is not as good as we expected ? I think investors still have doubts about online business, given the [sector's] previous meltdown," Tseng said.
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