■ECONOMY
Cabinet to provide loans
Taiwan’s Cabinet plans to provide NT$900 billion (US$27.4 billion) in loans to help businesses through the economic slowdown, the Chinese-language Commercial Times reported yesterday, citing Minister without Portfolio Chu Yun-peng (朱雲鵬). Under the plan, the Cabinet will first provide small and medium enterprises with NT$300 billion in loans and then start coordinating with seven state-run banks next month to offer NT$600 billion in loans to large corporations over the next two years, the report said. The Cabinet’s loan plan is part of the government’s effort to help companies obtain credit lines from banks and stave off layoffs. On Oct. 31, the Cabinet approved a short-term job-creation plan that aims to offer up to 56,000 jobs by June.
■ECONOMY
Export forecast lowered
Taiwan’s Bureau of Foreign Trade has reduced its export growth forecast for this year from 10 percent to 8 percent after exports declined in September and last month. Bureau Director-General Huang Chih-peng (黃志鵬) also said on Friday that growth next year was forecast at 8 percent, with a trade surplus of US$10 billion. Citing customs statistics, Huang said that Taiwan’s exports last month totaled US$20.81 billion, down US$1.88 billion, or 8.3 percent, from the same month last year.
■AVIATION
EVA to lead across Strait
EVA Airways Corp (長榮航空), the nation’s second-largest air carrier, will be able to fly a total of 23 charter passenger flights to China each week, along with its affiliate UNI Airways Corp (立榮航空), the Chinese-language Economic Daily News reported yesterday, citing the Civil Aeronautics Administration. China Airlines Ltd (CAL, 中華航空), the nation’s largest carrier, and its subsidiary, Mandarin Airlines Ltd (華信航空), will run a total of 22 charter passenger flights to China weekly. Their smaller rival, TransAsia Airways Corp (復興航空), will operate nine weekly flights, the report said. The new flights arrangement came after Taiwan and China signed an agreement on Tuesday in Taipei that allows the number of charter passenger flights to triple from 36 to 108 per week.
■ENERGY
Chavez hails Russia venture
Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez inaugurated his country’s first Venezuelan-Russian offshore natural gas project on Friday, hailing his country’s increasingly close energy cooperation with Russia as a counterweight to US imperialism. Donning hard hats, Chavez and Russian Deputy Prime Minister Igor Sechin mingled with workers from Venezuela’s government-controlled oil company and Russia’s state-run gas giant, Gazprom, as exploration began at a Gulf of Venezuela drilling platform. Gazprom won the contract to help develop two natural gas blocks in the gulf in 2005.
■AVIATION
Carrier, pilots ink pay pact
Singapore Airlines Ltd, the world’s largest carrier by market value, yesterday reached an agreement with pilots on pay and other benefits after a year of negotiations. The accord “forms the basis of a Points of Agreement that has been signed,” Singapore Airlines spokesman Stephen Forshaw said in an e-mailed statement that called the wage negotiations “challenging.” Singapore Airlines on Thursday reported that quarterly profit fell 36 percent, the biggest decline in more than three years to S$323.8 million (US$219 million), after it paid more for jet fuel and filled fewer seats.
SEEKING CLARITY: Washington should not adopt measures that create uncertainties for ‘existing semiconductor investments,’ TSMC said referring to its US$165 billion in the US Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) told the US that any future tariffs on Taiwanese semiconductors could reduce demand for chips and derail its pledge to increase its investment in Arizona. “New import restrictions could jeopardize current US leadership in the competitive technology industry and create uncertainties for many committed semiconductor capital projects in the US, including TSMC Arizona’s significant investment plan in Phoenix,” the chipmaker wrote in a letter to the US Department of Commerce. TSMC issued the warning in response to a solicitation for comments by the department on a possible tariff on semiconductor imports by US President Donald Trump’s
The government has launched a three-pronged strategy to attract local and international talent, aiming to position Taiwan as a new global hub following Nvidia Corp’s announcement that it has chosen Taipei as the site of its Taiwan headquarters. Nvidia cofounder and CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) on Monday last week announced during his keynote speech at the Computex trade show in Taipei that the Nvidia Constellation, the company’s planned Taiwan headquarters, would be located in the Beitou-Shilin Technology Park (北投士林科技園區) in Taipei. Huang’s decision to establish a base in Taiwan is “primarily due to Taiwan’s talent pool and its strength in the semiconductor
Industrial production expanded 22.31 percent annually last month to 107.51, as increases in demand for high-performance computing (HPC) and artificial intelligence (AI) applications drove demand for locally-made chips and components. The manufacturing production index climbed 23.68 percent year-on-year to 108.37, marking the 14th consecutive month of increase, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said. In the first four months of this year, industrial and manufacturing production indices expanded 14.31 percent and 15.22 percent year-on-year, ministry data showed. The growth momentum is to extend into this month, with the manufacturing production index expected to rise between 11 percent and 15.1 percent annually, Department of Statistics
An earnings report from semiconductor giant and artificial intelligence (AI) bellwether Nvidia Corp takes center stage for Wall Street this week, as stocks hit a speed bump of worries over US federal deficits driving up Treasury yields. US equities pulled back last week after a torrid rally, as investors turned their attention to tax and spending legislation poised to swell the US government’s US$36 trillion in debt. Long-dated US Treasury yields rose amid the fiscal worries, with the 30-year yield topping 5 percent and hitting its highest level since late 2023. Stocks were dealt another blow on Friday when US President Donald
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