■ Mega merges trust arms
Mega Financial Holding Co (兆豐金控), the nation's third-biggest financial group, announced yesterday that its board had decided to merge its two investment trust arms.
International Investment Trust Co (國際投信) will be the surviving entity after it absorbs Mega Investment Trust Corp (兆豐國際投信), the company said in a statement.
The surviving entity will be renamed Mega Investment Trust, the company said without providing a timeframe.
As of the end of last year, International Investment managed NT$32 billion (US$969.9 million) of assets while Mega Investment managed NT$32.9 billion, Mega Financial said.
The merged entity would control assets totaled NT$64.9 billion, or equivalent to a 3.3 percent market share, making it the 13th biggest among 40 investment trust firms in Taiwan, it added.
■ CPC rating unchanged
Taiwan Ratings Corp (中華信評) said yesterday that the ratings on CPC Corp, Taiwan (台灣中油) would be unaffected by the company's decision to change its name, because it was not accompanied by any change in strategy.
CPC, formerly Chinese Petroleum Corp (中國石油), is rated twAA+/Negative/twA-1.
The financial impact was expected to be limited to a one-time hit to cover related administrative and marketing expenses, Taiwan Ratings said.
Energy use growth slow
Taiwan's energy use last year grew at the slowest pace on record for a second year as higher credit-card debt and increased fuel prices reduced travel and car sales.
Energy consumption last year climbed 1.8 percent to the equivalent of 690.3 million barrels of oil, the Bureau of Energy said in a statement yesterday. Demand gained 3.1 percent in 2005.
Domestic airlines carried 10 percent fewer passengers last year, while fuel prices surged 11 percent, the Directorate General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics said.
Total vehicle sales declined 4.3 percent from a year earlier in December after plunging by 46 percent in November, according to the Taiwan Transportation Vehicle Manufacturers Association.
Energy consumption for transportation purposes climbed 0.7 percent last year, slower than 9.1 percent by electronics manufacturers, 7.1 percent by steelmakers and 2.8 percent by chemical producers, the energy bureau said.
■ APBT elects new chairman
Asia Pacific Broadband Telecom Co's (APBT, 亞太固網) board elected Lai Chun-tien (賴春田) as the firm's acting chairman yesterday, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said.
Lai will replace Wang Lin-mei (王令楣), who had served as acting chairwoman of the unit of the trouble Rebar Asia Pacific Group (力霸亞太企業集團).
Lai is an institutional representative for Taiwan Railway Administration, one of the major shareholders of APBT, Vice Minister of Economic Affairs Shih Yen-hsiang (施顏祥) said.
Lai, co-chairman of Price-waterhouseCoopers Taiwan, will be the acting chairman of Asia Pacific Broadband Wireless Communications Inc (亞太行動寬頻), Shih said.
The ministry sent a team to help audit the telecom firm's financial statements last month, but found the net worth of APBT is far lower than the NT$5 per share the company claimed, Shih said, without specifying the figure.
The ministry will not rule out the possibility to sell APBT's holdings to foreign investors, he said.
■ NT dollar strengthens
The NT dollar strengthened against the US dollar on the Taipei Foreign Exchange yesterday, gaining NT$0.091 to close at NT$32.990. A total of US$1.06 billion changed hands during the day's trading.
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