The Ministry of Finance is mulling the creation of a financing and investment platform to consolidate national resources and channel idle funds to public works projects, Deputy Minister of Finance Chang Sheng-ford (張盛和) said yesterday.
Chang said that although the state coffers have seen shrinking tax revenues while debts have escalated in line with the nation’s economic performance, there were still plenty of idle funds.
The ministry has said it is unlikely to meet its fiscal goal this year, as the economy is expected to contract 2.97 percent.
In the past, the government made up the deficit with bonds or surplus tax revenues from previous years.
The nation’s treasury is dwindling, with debts hitting 33.7 percent of GDP, Chang told a news conference.
“Yet huge national funds and assets are not being utilized,” he said.
STATE ASSETS
To address the issue, the deputy minister said his agency was seeking to learn from Japan or Singapore to set up a financing and investment institution, in the form of a fund or a bank, to better manage government assets.
The institution, whose formation would require legislative approval and oversight, would draw its funding from existing funds, government debts or other resources, Chang said, adding that the idea was still being studied.
The Japanese financing and investment fund was created in 1951 on government bonds to help raise money for public construction programs and underwrite loans for small and medium enterprises, the ministry said.
The global investment company in Singapore has a capitalization of more than US$100 billion devoted to managing the city state’s foreign exchange reserves, the ministry said.
12 PROJECTS
Chang said the ministry was seeking to raise NT$4 trillion (US$114 billion) to finance the “i-Taiwan 12 Projects” over the next eight years.
The program, intended to strengthen the nation’s infrastructure, is expected to play a key role in boosting GDP to 6 percent during the period.
The proposed institution could help raise money for construction, Chang said, adding that self-financing government funds would be prioritized.
In return, the institution would pay interest, the deputy minister said, adding that it would differ from bonds in that the latter could not be used for investment.
ISSUES: Gogoro has been struggling with ballooning losses and was recently embroiled in alleged subsidy fraud, using Chinese-made components instead of locally made parts Gogoro Inc (睿能創意), the nation’s biggest electric scooter maker, yesterday said that its chairman and CEO Horace Luke (陸學森) has resigned amid chronic losses and probes into the company’s alleged involvement in subsidy fraud. The board of directors nominated Reuntex Group (潤泰集團) general counsel Tamon Tseng (曾夢達) as the company’s new chairman, Gogoro said in a statement. Ruentex is Gogoro’s biggest stakeholder. Gogoro Taiwan general manager Henry Chiang (姜家煒) is to serve as acting CEO during the interim period, the statement said. Luke’s departure came as a bombshell yesterday. As a company founder, he has played a key role in pushing for the
China has claimed a breakthrough in developing homegrown chipmaking equipment, an important step in overcoming US sanctions designed to thwart Beijing’s semiconductor goals. State-linked organizations are advised to use a new laser-based immersion lithography machine with a resolution of 65 nanometers or better, the Chinese Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) said in an announcement this month. Although the note does not specify the supplier, the spec marks a significant step up from the previous most advanced indigenous equipment — developed by Shanghai Micro Electronics Equipment Group Co (SMEE, 上海微電子) — which stood at about 90 nanometers. MIIT’s claimed advances last
EUROPE ON HOLD: Among a flurry of announcements, Intel said it would postpone new factories in Germany and Poland, but remains committed to its US expansion Intel Corp chief executive officer Pat Gelsinger has landed Amazon.com Inc’s Amazon Web Services (AWS) as a customer for the company’s manufacturing business, potentially bringing work to new plants under construction in the US and boosting his efforts to turn around the embattled chipmaker. Intel and AWS are to coinvest in a custom semiconductor for artificial intelligence computing — what is known as a fabric chip — in a “multiyear, multibillion-dollar framework,” Intel said in a statement on Monday. The work would rely on Intel’s 18A process, an advanced chipmaking technology. Intel shares rose more than 8 percent in late trading after the
GLOBAL ECONOMY: Policymakers have a choice of a small 25 basis-point cut or a bold cut of 50 basis points, which would help the labor market, but might reignite inflation The US Federal Reserve is gearing up to announce its first interest rate cut in more than four years on Wednesday, with policymakers expected to debate how big a move to make less than two months before the US presidential election. Senior officials at the US central bank including Fed Chairman Jerome Powell have in recent weeks indicated that a rate cut is coming this month, as inflation eases toward the bank’s long-term target of two percent, and the labor market continues to cool. The Fed, which has a dual mandate from the US Congress to act independently to ensure