The New Taiwan dollar declined by the most in more than a week on concern the global economic slowdown will cut demand for Taiwan’s electronics exports. Bonds rose.
The currency fell against the US dollar as a report last week showed exports fell 8.3 percent last month from a year earlier, the biggest drop in more than three years, on weaker demand from China.
“The market is consolidating holdings for the time being, both in stocks and currencies,” said Irene Cheung, a corporate director for local-markets trading at ABN Amro Bank NV in Singapore. “There will be further downside in the Taiwan dollar. The market is looking at the real problems that the economy is facing.”
The currency fell 0.2 percent to NT$32.874 as of the 4pm close, Taipei Forex Inc said. It earlier touched NT$32.898.
The government might help chipmakers with short-term financing, the Chinese-language United Evening News reported on Monday, citing Vice Minister of Economic Affairs Shih Yen-shiang (施顏祥).
Taiwan’s 10-year bonds rose on speculation the central bank will cut interest rates.
Ten-year bond yields fell to the lowest since January 2006 after the central bank cut interest rates for the fourth time in seven weeks on Friday and said “the risk of an economic slowdown has risen.”
“Bonds are in a long-term bull market,” said Sam Chang, a debt trader at Polaris Securities Co (寶來證券) in Taipei. “The central bank will probably keep cutting interest rates.”
The yield on the benchmark 2.125 percent bond maturing September 2018 declined 7.7 basis points to 1.743 percent as of the 1:30pm close in Taipei, the GRETAI Securities Market said.
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
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],”