Deutsche Bank bonds are go
The Financial Supervisory Com-mission said yesterday that Deutsche Bank's application to issue the nation's first batch of US dollar-denominated corporate bonds will take effect next Tuesday, seven working days after the foreign bank lodged the application last Friday.
The whole batch of bonds to be traded in Taiwan's offshore bond market is worth US$200 million to US$500 million with a face value of US$10,000 per sheet and a yield of between 4.6 percent and 5 percent, the commission said in a statement released yesterday.
The market regulator is holding a game to name the bond with 15 choices for participants, including Formosa Bond and Taiwan 101 Bond.
Wafer foundries cool heels
The wafer foundry industry will have to wait up to six months for its clients to clear their inventory, a spokesman for Taiwan Semicon-ductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world's largest contract chipmaker, said yesterday.
The comments confirmed a Chinese-language Economic Daily News report, in which company vice chairman Tseng Fan-cheng (曾繁城) also said that the launch of new processors for personal computers and Microsoft's new operating system had not provided a much anticipated boost for the PC market.
"Yes, Tseng did say that," TSMC spokesman Tzeng Jinn-haw (曾晉皓) said on the excess inventory, "but he stopped short of saying the industry will begin witnessing a business upturn afterwards."
King's Town woos Lyu
King's Town Bank (京城銀行), the successor to Tainan Business Bank (台南企銀), announced on Sunday that it had invited former minister of finance Joseph Lyu (呂桔誠) to be the bank's chairman.
After raising NT$3.8 billion (US$115.36 million) and a change of name last year, King's Town has endeavored to promote its business and improve asset quality, lowering its bad loan ratio to 2.26 percent and raising its coverage ratio to 32.07 percent as of last month, the bank said in a filing yesterday.
The bank expected the appointment of Lyu, a seasoned banker, to help enhance operations and strengthen management in light of his experiences at the Bank of Taiwan (台灣銀行), the Land Bank of Taiwan (土地銀行) and foreign financial institutions, the filing said.
Lyu stepped down in July after a five-month stint at the finance ministry amid heavy criticism of the ministry's loss of board seats in state-controlled Mega Financial Holding Co (兆豐金控) to smaller rival Chinatrust Financial Holding Co (中信金控). The loss raised concerns of a conflict of interest.
Money supply growth down
The nation's growth in money supply slowed last month as expansion in bank lending and investment cooled.
M2, the broadest measure of money supply, rose 5.43 percent last month from a year earlier after gaining 5.72 percent in July, the Central Bank of China said yesterday.
M1A, which tracks net currency in circulation plus checking accounts and passbook deposits, gained 3.18 percent last month after climbing 4.58 percent in July, the central bank said.
M1B, which excludes time deposits and foreign-currency deposits included in M2, rose 2.77 percent last month from a year earlier, following a 3.12 percent increase the previous month.
NT dollar gains on greenback
The New Taiwan dollar gained against the US dollar on the Taipei Foreign Exchange yesterday, moving up NT$0.001 to close at NT$32.939. A total of US$627 million changed hands during the day's trading.
SETBACK: Apple’s India iPhone push has been disrupted after Foxconn recalled hundreds of Chinese engineers, amid Beijing’s attempts to curb tech transfers Apple Inc assembly partner Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), also known internationally as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團), has recalled about 300 Chinese engineers from a factory in India, the latest setback for the iPhone maker’s push to rapidly expand in the country. The extraction of Chinese workers from the factory of Yuzhan Technology (India) Private Ltd, a Hon Hai component unit, in southern Tamil Nadu state, is the second such move in a few months. The company has started flying in Taiwanese engineers to replace staff leaving, people familiar with the matter said, asking not to be named, as the
The prices of gasoline and diesel at domestic fuel stations are to rise NT$0.1 and NT$0.4 per liter this week respectively, after international crude oil prices rose last week, CPC Corp, Taiwan (台灣中油) and Formosa Petrochemical Corp (台塑石化) announced yesterday. Effective today, gasoline prices at CPC and Formosa stations are to rise to NT$27.3, NT$28.8 and NT$30.8 per liter for 92, 95 and 98-octane unleaded gasoline respectively, the companies said in separate statements. The price of premium diesel is to rise to NT$26.2 per liter at CPC stations and NT$26 at Formosa pumps, they said. The announcements came after international crude oil prices
DOLLAR SIGNS: The central bank rejected claims that the NT dollar had appreciated 10 percentage points more than the yen or the won against the greenback The New Taiwan dollar yesterday fell for a sixth day to its weakest level in three months, driven by equity-related outflows and reactions to an economics official’s exchange rate remarks. The NT dollar slid NT$0.197, or 0.65 percent, to close at NT$30.505 per US dollar, central bank data showed. The local currency has depreciated 1.97 percent so far this month, ranking as the weakest performer among Asian currencies. Dealers attributed the retreat to foreign investors wiring capital gains and dividends abroad after taking profit in local shares. They also pointed to reports that Washington might consider taking equity stakes in chipmakers, including Taiwan Semiconductor
A German company is putting used electric vehicle batteries to new use by stacking them into fridge-size units that homes and businesses can use to store their excess solar and wind energy. This week, the company Voltfang — which means “catching volts” — opened its first industrial site in Aachen, Germany, near the Belgian and Dutch borders. With about 100 staff, Voltfang says it is the biggest facility of its kind in Europe in the budding sector of refurbishing lithium-ion batteries. Its CEO David Oudsandji hopes it would help Europe’s biggest economy ween itself off fossil fuels and increasingly rely on climate-friendly renewables. While