State-run Taiwan Power Co (Taipower, 台電) will be broken into units as a first step before the government sells shares in the business, Minister of Economics Steve Chen (陳瑞隆) said.
The company may be divided into "distribution, power generation, and maybe nuclear," Chen said in an interview on May 11, without giving details such as a timetable.
"That is the first question that will be looked into," he said.
Taiwan's government requires the approval of the opposition Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT), which controls the legislature, to sell down its 97 percent stake in the utility, and has missed two previous sales targets.
Selling shares in state companies would help plug the budget deficit, projected to reach NT$217.1 billion (US$6.5 billion) this year.
The sale plans are "already 10 years late," Sophia Cheng (
The government also wants to sell more than 51 percent of shipbuilder CSBC Corp, Taiwan (
Taipower, which generates about 75 percent of the country's electricity and is its only power distributor, has capital of NT$330 billion, 28 percent more than that of Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (
The utility's assets are estimated at NT$1.35 trillion, according to the company's Web site. That's equivalent to about 12 percent of the country's gross domestic product.
The government's plans to sell state-owned businesses have been delayed by accusations from KMT that the assets are being sold too cheaply, and by protests from labor unions.
Chen said the ministry will discuss the plans to split up and sell Taipower with the company's workers.
CSBC, the country's largest shipyard with capital of NT$11 billion, has already attracted interest from foreign companies, Chen said, declining to identify them.
Kaohsiung-headquartered CSBC, 99 percent owned by the government, has two shipyards and produces about 2 percent of the world's ships by tonnage, according to the prospectus issued to potential investors.
The company's net income this year may almost triple to NT$1 billion, from a forecast NT$339 million last year, according to this year's draft budget bill. The shipyard had been unprofitable until 2001, when it fired 47 percent of its workers.
Taiwan's economy, Asia's fifth largest, may expand 4.6 percent this year, faster than the government previously predicted, Chen said.
Growth of 4.3 percent for this year was predicted by the state statistics bureau on Feb. 15, after the country expanded 4.62 percent last year.
The higher estimate stems partly from a target of 12 percent export growth based on stronger promotion of exports and brand-product sales, Chen said in the interview.
The Directorate General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) had forecast a 6.2 percent growth in exports for the year, less than half of last year's 12.9 percent. The country's exports grew 7.7 percent in the first four months, according to the Ministry of Finance.
The government wants gross domestic product to rise an average 5 percent between this year and 2015 after growing about 4 percent on average between 2000 and last year, said David Hong (
"I'm cautiously optimistic Taiwan can reach the goal, as long as it can continue to ease investment rules and improve government efficiency," Hong said.
"Taiwan businesses should diversify investment to non-China areas," he said.
JITTERS: Nexperia has a 20 percent market share for chips powering simpler features such as window controls, and changing supply chains could take years European carmakers are looking into ways to scratch components made with parts from China, spooked by deepening geopolitical spats playing out through chipmaker Nexperia BV and Beijing’s export controls on rare earths. To protect operations from trade ructions, several automakers are pushing major suppliers to find permanent alternatives to Chinese semiconductors, people familiar with the matter said. The industry is considering broader changes to its supply chain to adapt to shifting geopolitics, Europe’s main suppliers lobby CLEPA head Matthias Zink said. “We had some indications already — questions like: ‘How can you supply me without this dependency on China?’” Zink, who also
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) received about NT$147 billion (US$4.71 billion) in subsidies from the US, Japanese, German and Chinese governments over the past two years for its global expansion. Financial data compiled by the world’s largest contract chipmaker showed the company secured NT$4.77 billion in subsidies from the governments in the third quarter, bringing the total for the first three quarters of the year to about NT$71.9 billion. Along with the NT$75.16 billion in financial aid TSMC received last year, the chipmaker obtained NT$147 billion in subsidies in almost two years, the data showed. The subsidies received by its subsidiaries —
The number of Taiwanese working in the US rose to a record high of 137,000 last year, driven largely by Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co’s (TSMC, 台積電) rapid overseas expansion, according to government data released yesterday. A total of 666,000 Taiwanese nationals were employed abroad last year, an increase of 45,000 from 2023 and the highest level since the COVID-19 pandemic, data from the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) showed. Overseas employment had steadily increased between 2009 and 2019, peaking at 739,000, before plunging to 319,000 in 2021 amid US-China trade tensions, global supply chain shifts, reshoring by Taiwanese companies and
At least US$50 million for the freedom of an Emirati sheikh: That is the king’s ransom paid two weeks ago to militants linked to al-Qaeda who are pushing to topple the Malian government and impose Islamic law. Alongside a crippling fuel blockade, the Group for the Support of Islam and Muslims (JNIM) has made kidnapping wealthy foreigners for a ransom a pillar of its strategy of “economic jihad.” Its goal: Oust the junta, which has struggled to contain Mali’s decade-long insurgency since taking power following back-to-back coups in 2020 and 2021, by scaring away investors and paralyzing the west African country’s economy.
RSS