Asia Cement (China) Holdings Corp (亞洲水泥中國控股), the Chinese unit of the Taiwan producer, rose as much as 62 percent in its trading debut in Hong Kong, buoyed by anticipated demand after the earthquake in China last week.
The stock gained 44 percent to HK$7.15 at the 12:30pm break on the Hong Kong stock exchange. The company sold 375 million shares at HK$4.95 each in an initial public offering, a statement said, raising HK$1.86 billion (US$238 million).
The unit, whose profit almost tripled last year, resumed shipping and production at its factory near the epicenter of the May 12 earthquake in Sichuan Province after a three-day shutdown. Demand will rise with reconstruction efforts, a company executive said.
“We’ll have a hard time to keep pace” with cement demand, Douglas Hsu (徐旭東), chairman of Asian Cement Corp (亞泥), parent of the Hong Kong-listed company, said yesterday. “There’s a lot of construction waiting to be built in the region.”
The affected factory, 100km from the epicenter of the tremor, has an annual capacity of 2 million tonnes, about a fifth of total production. The unit will add two kilns a year to double capacity to 20 million tonnes by 2011, Hsu said.
Asia Cement would use part of the share sale proceeds to acquire rivals in China, Hsu said. Rising raw costs will have minimal effect on earnings, he said.
“We always have a reserve capacity of coal and other materials for two to three months,” he said.
DIVIDED VIEWS: Although the Fed agreed on holding rates steady, some officials see no rate cuts for this year, while 10 policymakers foresee two or more cuts There are a lot of unknowns about the outlook for the economy and interest rates, but US Federal Reserve Chair Jerome Powell signaled at least one thing seems certain: Higher prices are coming. Fed policymakers voted unanimously to hold interest rates steady at a range of 4.25 percent to 4.50 percent for a fourth straight meeting on Wednesday, as they await clarity on whether tariffs would leave a one-time or more lasting mark on inflation. Powell said it is still unclear how much of the bill would fall on the shoulders of consumers, but he expects to learn more about tariffs
Meta Platforms Inc offered US$100 million bonuses to OpenAI employees in an unsuccessful bid to poach the ChatGPT maker’s talent and strengthen its own generative artificial intelligence (AI) teams, OpenAI CEO Sam Altman has said. Facebook’s parent company — a competitor of OpenAI — also offered “giant” annual salaries exceeding US$100 million to OpenAI staffers, Altman said in an interview on the Uncapped with Jack Altman podcast released on Tuesday. “It is crazy,” Sam Altman told his brother Jack in the interview. “I’m really happy that at least so far none of our best people have decided to take them
PLANS: MSI is also planning to upgrade its service center in the Netherlands Micro-Star International Co (MSI, 微星) yesterday said it plans to set up a server assembly line at its Poland service center this year at the earliest. The computer and peripherals manufacturer expects that the new server assembly line would shorten transportation times in shipments to European countries, a company spokesperson told the Taipei Times by telephone. MSI manufactures motherboards, graphics cards, notebook computers, servers, optical storage devices and communication devices. The company operates plants in Taiwan and China, and runs a global network of service centers. The company is also considering upgrading its service center in the Netherlands into a
NOT JUSTIFIED: The bank’s governor said there would only be a rate cut if inflation falls below 1.5% and economic conditions deteriorate, which have not been detected The central bank yesterday kept its key interest rates unchanged for a fifth consecutive quarter, aligning with market expectations, while slightly lowering its inflation outlook amid signs of cooling price pressures. The move came after the US Federal Reserve held rates steady overnight, despite pressure from US President Donald Trump to cut borrowing costs. Central bank board members unanimously voted to maintain the discount rate at 2 percent, the secured loan rate at 2.375 percent and the overnight lending rate at 4.25 percent. “We consider the policy decision appropriate, although it suggests tightening leaning after factoring in slackening inflation and stable GDP growth,”
RSS