Amid the upcoming launch of cross-strait weekend charter flights on Friday, China Airlines (CAL, 華航), the nation’s largest airline, said yesterday that flights between Taiwan and Shanghai, Beijing and Xiamen for the first week were full, and that seats on second and third-week flights were 80 percent and 70 percent full respectively.
However, the company said the Guangzhou route, to be launched in the second week, had only reached 60 percent capacity, which China Airlines spokesman Bruce Chen (陳鵬宇) described as “so-so.”
CHINA-BOUND
Chen also said that more Taiwanese travelers than Chinese travelers planned to board the charter flights, and that passenger rates for Taiwan-bound flights were 20 percent lower than China-bound flights.
“China Airlines will likely start receiving more Chinese customers in the third week, when Chinese tourists begin to visit Taiwan,” Chen told reporters at a press conference yesterday.
Meanwhile, China Airlines yesterday unveiled the in-flight meals that the company planned in cooperation with Formosa International Hotels Corp (晶華國際酒店集團), the parent company of the newly opened Chinese restaurant Silks Palace (故宮晶華), located at the National Palace Museum (國立故宮博物院).
China Airlines business class customers will be able to enjoy dishes called “jade cabbage” (翠玉白菜) and “meat-shaped stone” (肉形石) — named after items in the museums collection — on flights from China to Taiwan, while economy class customers will enjoy Taiwanese food.
EVA PLANS
In a separate event yesterday, the nation’s second largest airline, EVA Airways Corp (長榮航空), and its subsidiary Uni Airways Corp (立榮航空) announced a different strategy — in-flights meals based on the flights’ destinations.
Chinese dishes including Beijing duck will be served to Beijing-bound passengers, while Taiwan-bound passengers will be able to enjoy local favorites such as beef noodles, the airline said yesterday.
The US dollar was trading at NT$29.7 at 10am today on the Taipei Foreign Exchange, as the New Taiwan dollar gained NT$1.364 from the previous close last week. The NT dollar continued to rise today, after surging 3.07 percent on Friday. After opening at NT$30.91, the NT dollar gained more than NT$1 in just 15 minutes, briefly passing the NT$30 mark. Before the US Department of the Treasury's semi-annual currency report came out, expectations that the NT dollar would keep rising were already building. The NT dollar on Friday closed at NT$31.064, up by NT$0.953 — a 3.07 percent single-day gain. Today,
‘SHORT TERM’: The local currency would likely remain strong in the near term, driven by anticipated US trade pressure, capital inflows and expectations of a US Fed rate cut The US dollar is expected to fall below NT$30 in the near term, as traders anticipate increased pressure from Washington for Taiwan to allow the New Taiwan dollar to appreciate, Cathay United Bank (國泰世華銀行) chief economist Lin Chi-chao (林啟超) said. Following a sharp drop in the greenback against the NT dollar on Friday, Lin told the Central News Agency that the local currency is likely to remain strong in the short term, driven in part by market psychology surrounding anticipated US policy pressure. On Friday, the US dollar fell NT$0.953, or 3.07 percent, closing at NT$31.064 — its lowest level since Jan.
Hong Kong authorities ramped up sales of the local dollar as the greenback’s slide threatened the foreign-exchange peg. The Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) sold a record HK$60.5 billion (US$7.8 billion) of the city’s currency, according to an alert sent on its Bloomberg page yesterday in Asia, after it tested the upper end of its trading band. That added to the HK$56.1 billion of sales versus the greenback since Friday. The rapid intervention signals efforts from the city’s authorities to limit the local currency’s moves within its HK$7.75 to HK$7.85 per US dollar trading band. Heavy sales of the local dollar by
The Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC) yesterday met with some of the nation’s largest insurance companies as a skyrocketing New Taiwan dollar piles pressure on their hundreds of billions of dollars in US bond investments. The commission has asked some life insurance firms, among the biggest Asian holders of US debt, to discuss how the rapidly strengthening NT dollar has impacted their operations, people familiar with the matter said. The meeting took place as the NT dollar jumped as much as 5 percent yesterday, its biggest intraday gain in more than three decades. The local currency surged as exporters rushed to
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