Electronics sector lifts TAIEX
Taiwanese shares closed up 2.82 percent yesterday as the bellwether electronics sector led a technical rebound, dealers said.
The weighted index rose 126.08 points to 4,592.50, off a low of 4,504.71 and a high of 4,599.61, on turnover of NT$74.56 billion (US$2.19 billion).
Gainers led losers by 1,449 to 237, with 118 stocks unchanged.
The market opened up 0.86 percent on a strong showing by the high-tech sector and the momentum extended until the end of the session, with buying spreading to almost all other sectors, dealers said.
For the week, the weighted index rose 119.25 points or 2.67 percent after a 5.26 percent increase from a week earlier. Average daily turnover stood at US$73.6 billion, compared with US$59.76 billion the previous week.
Fuel prices to rise
Domestic gasoline and diesel prices will increase by NT$0.4 and NT$0.5 per liter respectively to reflect world crude prices, CPC Corp, Taiwan (CPC, 台灣中油) announced yesterday.
After the adjustment, which takes effect today, CPC’s price for a liter of 98-octane unleaded gasoline will be NT$25, 95-octane unleaded gasoline will cost NT$23.5 and 92-octane unleaded gasoline will cost NT$22.8. Meanwhile, diesel will cost NT$20 per liter.
The state-owned oil refinery adjusts its energy prices every Friday afternoon, with the new prices effective the following day. To date, the unprofitable CPC is still absorbing the rise in the international market at the request of government.
CPC assigns its oil prices by using energy information provider Platt’s reports on average petroleum prices from Dubai and Brent with a 70 percent and 30 percent allocation, the company said.
Rival Formosa Petrochemical Corp (台塑石化) announced it would match CPC’s price hikes, effective today.
‘Difficult’ year for Hong Kong
Hong Kong banks face a difficult year as lending slows and demand for investment products weaken as the economy moves deeper into its first recession since 2003, the city’s central bank said.
“[The year’s] operating environment will inevitably be difficult,” Y.K. Choi (蔡耀君), deputy chief executive officer of the Hong Kong Monetary Authority, told reporters at a briefing yesterday. “Some banks may see red.”
Japan’s spending falls
Japanese household spending fell 1.9 percent last year from a year before to ¥296,932 (US$3,290) per month, the government said yesterday.
Spending for food dropped 1.9 percent from the previous year while utility expenditure declined 1.3 percent last year, the Internal Affairs and Communications Ministry said.
The average monthly income of salaried households dipped 0.6 percent last year to ¥534,235 from a year before.
The yearly average of monthly spending by salaried households also dropped 1.1 percent to ¥324,929.
NT dollar continues decline
The New Taiwan dollar continued losing ground against the US dollar on the Taipei Foreign Exchange yesterday, declining NT$0.025 to close at NT$34.05.
The NT dollar dropped this week on speculation exports will extend last month’s slump, as US President Barack Obama’s stimulus plan may fail to revive demand.
“Our outlook for the Taiwan dollar is still weak,” said Thio Chin Loo, senior currency strategist at BNP Paribas in Singapore.
Regarding the US stimulus plan, she said: “The situation is still gloomy, which supports the dollar against Taiwan.”
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