Shares in solar cell makers soared yesterday after oil prices continued breaking records on global markets in the wake of the latest industry figures showing a surprise fall in US crude reserves.
Shares of Motech Industries Inc (
US light crude rose as high as US$96.24 in trading yesterday morning in Asia before falling back to US$96.05.
On average, solar shares grew 0.39 percent yesterday, outperforming a 0.78 percent decline in the over-the-counter GRETAI Securities Market index and a 1.17 percent drop in the benchmark TAIEX index.
The TAIEX yesterday tumbled 113.14 points to 9,598.23 as investors worried that "higher costs could eventually choke economic growth," SinoPac Securities Co (
Shares of Motech also gained support from the release of sales figures for last month.
The company yesterday posted record sales of NT$1.44 billion (US$44.4 million) for last month, up 55 percent from a year ago and a 2 percent increase from September.
For the first 10 months, the company's revenues jumped 111.2 percent year-on-year to NT$12.55 billion, the company's figures showed.
Last week, Motech disappointed investors as it reported that its gross margin had fallen to 17.5 percent in the third quarter -- from 18.5 percent in the second quarter and more than 20 percent in the first quarter -- owing to rising raw materials prices caused by a persistent shortage.
Motech president Simon Tsuo (
Rival E-ton also saw its third-quarter gross margin edge down to 13.63 percent, the lowest since the company started trading its shares on the GRETAI Securities Market in March last year.
E-ton said its fourth-quarter margin would improve after it began to get silicon wafer supplies from Adema Technologies last month.
E-ton had acquired Adema Technologies, a US-based manufacturer of solar power parts, in June.
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
New apartments in Taiwan’s major cities are getting smaller, while old apartments are increasingly occupied by older people, many of whom live alone, government data showed. The phenomenon has to do with sharpening unaffordable property prices and an aging population, property brokers said. Apartments with one bedroom that are two years old or older have gained a noticeable presence in the nation’s six special municipalities as well as Hsinchu county and city in the past five years, Evertrust Rehouse Co (永慶房產集團) found, citing data from the government’s real-price transaction platform. In Taipei, apartments with one bedroom accounted for 19 percent of deals last
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