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Shares close down

Shares closed 0.53 percent lower yesterday following a lackluster finish on Wall Street overnight, with investors cautiously awaiting the outcome of the US Federal Reserve meeting on interest rates, dealers said.

The TAIEX was down 43.14 points at 8,052.70, on turnover of NT$86.04 billion (US$2.58 billion).

On the Taipei foreign exchange market, the New Taiwan dollar lost NT$0.021 to close at NT$33.275 against the US dollar.

Kaohsiung still No.6

Kaohsiung Harbor remained the world's sixth busiest port by shipping last year, after Singapore, Hong Kong, Shanghai, Shenzhen and Busan, statistics from the Ministry of Transportation and Communications showed.

Kaohsiung Harbor, which operated 9.77 million TEU (20 feet equivalent unit) containers last year, has ranked sixth since 2003.

Ports in China, however, have seen significant progress over the past few years. For the first quarter of this year, Shanghai Port surpassed Hong Kong to be the world's second-busiest port with operation of 5.88 million TEU containers, up by 28 percent from the same time last year, the statistics showed.

BenQ chairman stays on board

BenQ Corp (明基) said chairman Lee Kun-yao (李焜耀) won't resign after being charged with insider trading and money laundering, resisting calls from some investors.

Lee will continue to oversee the Taoyuan-based company's daily operations, although he and four executives were indicted on Tuesday night for insider trading. BenQ rejected the charges.

National coffers boosted

The national coffers took in NT$99.3 billion (US$3 billion) in tax revenues last month, up 16.5 percent or an increase of NT$14.1 billion from a year earlier, the Ministry of Finance said yesterday.

The biggest boost came from income tax revenues, which rose by NT$4.4 billion last month to NT$20.9 billion, posting an annual growth rate of 27 percent compared with other sources of tax.

License tax revenues reached NT$32 billion, up 14.3 percent, or an increase of NT$4 billion from a year ago. Securities transaction taxes amounted to NT$8.9 billion last month, up by 7.8 percent year-on-year as the booming international stock market stimulated the local bourse.

In the period from January to last month, the total tax revenues reached NT$391.9 billion, up 1.9 percent or a jump of NT$7.4 billion over last year's level.

Toyota posts record profit

Toyota Motor Corp reported yesterday another year of record earnings, becoming the first Japanese company ever to post an operating profit of more than ?2 trillion (US$16.6 billion) thanks to brisk sales overseas.

But Toyota was cautious on the outlook for the current year, predicting only a slight gain in earnings to another all-time high.

Net earnings rose 19.8 percent to ?1.64 trillion in the year to March, helped by a weak yen, while revenue increased 13.8 percent to ?23.95 trillion, Toyota said.

Taiwan drops in rankings

Non-economic factors, rather than economic performance, have contributed to Taiwan's one-notch drop in the latest world competitiveness rankings from the IMD Business School in Lausanne, Switzerland, officials said.

In the soon-to-be-released IMD report, Taiwan has declined to 18th, while China has for the first time overtaken Taiwan.

Officials from the Ministry of Economic Affairs attributed Taiwan's declined rating o weak social coherence and solidarity, political instability and policy inconsistency.




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