Gordon Chen (陳樹), the new head of the Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC), urged the public not to lose confidence in the nation’s economy as a result of the recent slide in the domestic stock market.
“Judging from the current economic situation, [conditions] should get better in the future. Many corporations at home and abroad are also generally confident about our prospects for the next two quarters,” he told reporters before meeting Legislative Speaker Wang Jin-pyng (王金平).
Chen urged investors not to be disheartened by last week’s drop in the stock market to a five-month low.
He promised to monitor the stock index and encouraged companies to increase their investment.
“The new government will push for the ‘i-Taiwan’ 12 infrastructure projects to boost domestic demand, financial reform and tax reform. The future will be better,” he said.
The TAIEX closed down 0.73 percent yesterday as a result of weakness in some heavyweight electronics and financial shares, dealers said.
The weighted index closed down 54.12 points at 7,353.86 on trading volume of NT$103.66 billion (US$3.42 billion).
“Weakness in major electronics shares like Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co [台積電] and MediaTek [聯發科], despite support of government funds, dragged down the key index,” said Chen Yu-yu (陳育榆) of Capital Securities (群益證券).
He said financial firms also came under pressure on negative leads such as the financial woes of Everskill Technology, which forced Chinatrust Financial Holding (中信金) to plan to list NT$1 billion in bad debt for last month.
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
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”
Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 0.7 percent and 13.6 percent respectively from a year earlier, setting record highs for the month of March, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Sales in the wholesale sector also grew last month by 4.6 annually, mainly due to the business opportunities for emerging applications related to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing technologies, the ministry said in a report. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales this month would retain their growth momentum as the former would benefit from Tomb Sweeping Day
Thousands of parents in Singapore are furious after a Cordlife Group Ltd (康盛人生集團), a major operator of cord blood banks in Asia, irreparably damaged their children’s samples through improper handling, with some now pursuing legal action. The ongoing case, one of the worst to hit the largely untested industry, has renewed concerns over companies marketing themselves to anxious parents with mostly unproven assurances. This has implications across the region, given Cordlife’s operations in Hong Kong, Macau, Indonesia, the Philippines and India. The parents paid for years to have their infants’ cord blood stored, with the understanding that the stem cells they contained