TAIEX closes down
Shares closed little changed yesterday as profit-taking put a lid on follow-through buying after the market breached the 8,000 points level last week, dealers said.
The TAIEX closed down 8.17 points or 0.10 percent at 8,048.39, on turnover of NT$113.68 billion (US$3.44 billion).
On the local foreign exchange market, the New Taiwan dollar lost ground against its US counterpart, declining NT$0.016 to close at NT$33.088. Turnover was US$811 million on the Taipei Forex Inc.
CPC lowers gas price
State-run CPC Corp, Taiwan (CPC, 台灣中油) announced yesterday that it will lower wholesale prices of domestic gasoline and diesel products by NT$1 a liter, as a result of falling crude oil costs.
The new rates were set to take effect last night at midnight, according to a company statement published on its Web site.
The change will bring the price of 98-octane unleaded gasoline to NT$28.50 (US$0.86) per liter, and those of 95-octane unleaded gasoline to NT$27 and 92-octane unleaded gasoline, NT$26.30.
Prices of top-grade diesel oil will be NT$23.60 per liter and that of ordinary diesel, NT$23.1, the company said.
Smaller rival Formosa Petrochemical Corp (台塑石化) later yesterday said it would also drop its prices, effective from 2am today.
Ya Hsin gets loan extension
Ya Hsin Industrial Co (雅新實業), one of the nation's leading printed circuit board makers, yesterday said more than 30 credit banks had agreed initially to extend the interest payment on its loans for six months, easing the firm's cash crunch.
Ya Hsin is under pressure to obtain financial support from credit banks after its stock was banned from margin trading last week on alleged financial flaws.
In a filing with the Taiwan Stock Exchange yesterday, Ya Hsin said some credit banks had also agreed not to unfreeze its deposit accounts.
The banks froze the company's accounts last month following probes into the firm's alleged financial blunder.
TSMC sales rise
World No. 1 chip foundry Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) yesterday posted sales of NT$22.56 billion (US$683 million) for last month, up 7.68 percent from February.
In the first quarter to last month, sales stood at NT$64.90 billion, exceeding the company's guidance of between NT$62 billion and NT$64 billion, but down from NT$74.96 billion achieved in the fourth quarter of last year.
Exports to PRC in third place
Statistics compiled by China's customs showed that Taiwan was the country's third-largest source of imports, behind only Japan and South Korea, for the first two months of this year, a Ministry of Economic Affairs spokesman said yesterday.
The statistics show that 10.36 percent of China's imports for the period came from Taiwan, down 0.98 percentage points from the figure for the same period a year earlier, while 13.91 percent of imports came from Japan, and 11.59 percent came from South Korea.
Elpida pulls in profit
Elpida Memory Inc, Japan's biggest maker of memory for personal computers, reported a record annual profit, reversing from a loss a year earlier.
Net income was ¥53 billion (US$445 million) in the 12 months ended March 31, compared with a ?4.7 billion loss the previous year, Tokyo-based Elpida said in a statement yesterday. Sales doubled to a record ?490 billion.
"Until the end of the third quarter, sales grew because of a rise in DRAM chip sales," Elpida said in the statement.
Taiwan Transport and Storage Corp (TTS, 台灣通運倉儲) yesterday unveiled its first electric tractor unit — manufactured by Volvo Trucks — in a ceremony in Taipei, and said the unit would soon be used to transport cement produced by Taiwan Cement Corp (TCC, 台灣水泥). Both TTS and TCC belong to TCC International Holdings Ltd (台泥國際集團). With the electric tractor unit, the Taipei-based cement firm would become the first in Taiwan to use electric vehicles to transport construction materials. TTS chairman Koo Kung-yi (辜公怡), Volvo Trucks vice president of sales and marketing Johan Selven, TCC president Roman Cheng (程耀輝) and Taikoo Motors Group
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
RECORD-BREAKING: TSMC’s net profit last quarter beat market expectations by expanding 8.9% and it was the best first-quarter profit in the chipmaker’s history Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), which counts Nvidia Corp as a key customer, yesterday said that artificial intelligence (AI) server chip revenue is set to more than double this year from last year amid rising demand. The chipmaker expects the growth momentum to continue in the next five years with an annual compound growth rate of 50 percent, TSMC chief executive officer C.C. Wei (魏哲家) told investors yesterday. By 2028, AI chips’ contribution to revenue would climb to about 20 percent from a percentage in the low teens, Wei said. “Almost all the AI innovators are working with TSMC to address the
FUTURE PLANS: Although the electric vehicle market is getting more competitive, Hon Hai would stick to its goal of seizing a 5 percent share globally, Young Liu said Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), a major iPhone assembler and supplier of artificial intelligence (AI) servers powered by Nvidia Corp’s chips, yesterday said it has introduced a rotating chief executive structure as part of the company’s efforts to cultivate future leaders and to enhance corporate governance. The 50-year-old contract electronics maker reported sizable revenue of NT$6.16 trillion (US$189.67 billion) last year. Hon Hai, also known as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團), has been under the control of one man almost since its inception. A rotating CEO system is a rarity among Taiwanese businesses. Hon Hai has given leaders of the company’s six