Shares fall slightly
Taiwanese shares closed little changed yesterday amid ongoing probes into money-laundering allegations implicating former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) and his family, dealers said.
The weighted index fell 6.84 points, or 0.10 percent, to 6,911.64, off a low of 6,837.25 and a high of 6,994.80 on turnover of NT$78.93 billion (US$2.51 billion).
The market opened higher on a technical rebound but profit-taking followed to erode gains as investors remained wary of investigations into the money-laundering allegations, dealers said.
Moreover, higher crude oil prices had renewed fears of inflation, they said.
“As the market moved higher, investors tended to pocket their money.
Yesterday’s movements clearly demonstrated weak investor confidence,” Taiwan International Securities (金鼎證券) analyst Arch Shih (施博元) said.
Shih said the relatively low turnover also reflected poor market sentiment.
However, he said the bright side was that the market seemed to have short-term technical support at around 6,800 points.
“The market has entered a consolidation mode. Without trading volume expanding, it is hard for the bourse to get out of the current narrow range,” he said.
HannStar in share buyback
Local liquid-crystal-display (LCD) panel maker HannStar Display Corp (瀚宇彩晶) yesterday said it planned to spend as much as NT$2.32 billion to buy back 255 million common shares to boost return on equity for shareholders.
HannStar said it planned to buy the shares, about 5 percent of the company’s total outstanding stock, for between NT$7 and NT$13.03 for a two-month period ending Oct. 24, according to a filing to the Taiwan Stock Exchange yesterday.
The firm plans to cancel the shares repurchased. Its board approved the share buyback plan yesterday.
Uni-President loses millions
Uni-President Enterprises Corp’s (統一企業) China-listed holding company has suffered 128 million yuan (US$18.73 million) in exchange losses in the first half of this year, a report said yesterday.
The firm’s first-half earnings declined by 18.4 percent from a year ago to 212 million yuan, the Chinese-language Commercial Times newspaper reported yesterday.
The company said it failed to fully convert 4 billion yuan raised from its initial public offerings late last year.
The subsidiary, 73.5 percent owned by the parent, posted 13.1 percent year-on-year growth to 5,037 billion yuan in the first half of the year, the report said.
After-tax profits registered 212 million yuan, an 18.4 percent year-on-year decline, the report said.
Chi Mei donates building
The Chi Mei Group (奇美集團) — the world’s fourth-largest manufacturer of liquid-crystal-display panels in terms of revenue — will donate a NT$440 million (US$14 million) building to National Chiao Tung University’s Tainan campus, an executive of the group announced yesterday.
Frank Liao (廖錦祥), chairman of Chi Mei Corp and Chi Mei Optoelectronics Corp (奇美光電) — two subsidiaries of the Chi Mei Group — said the building is scheduled to be completed by the end of next August in time for the beginning of the fall semester.
The facility will house Taiwan’s first College of Optoelectronics, which will cultivate talent for the electro-optical industry, Liao said.
NT dollar strengthens
The New Taiwan dollar yesterday firmed by NT$0.019 to trade at NT$31.370 against the greenback on turnover of US$840 million.
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
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
FUTURE PLANS: Although the electric vehicle market is getting more competitive, Hon Hai would stick to its goal of seizing a 5 percent share globally, Young Liu said Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), a major iPhone assembler and supplier of artificial intelligence (AI) servers powered by Nvidia Corp’s chips, yesterday said it has introduced a rotating chief executive structure as part of the company’s efforts to cultivate future leaders and to enhance corporate governance. The 50-year-old contract electronics maker reported sizable revenue of NT$6.16 trillion (US$189.67 billion) last year. Hon Hai, also known as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團), has been under the control of one man almost since its inception. A rotating CEO system is a rarity among Taiwanese businesses. Hon Hai has given leaders of the company’s six