Shares close slightly higher
Taiwanese shares closed marginally higher yesterday despite Wall Street’s sharp fall overnight as investors stayed on the sidelines ahead of the G20 summit this week, dealers said.
The weighted index edged up 4.79 points, or 0.09 percent, to 5,210.84 on turnover of NT$94.24 billion (US$2.77 billion).
Losers outnumbered gainers 1,039 to 891, while 141 shares were unchanged. Thirty-four stocks rose by their 7 percent daily limit, against 21 that closed limit-down.
The local market was stable although Wall Street plunged when the US government warned that General Motors and Chrysler faced bankruptcy and US banks could need more aid. The local market fell 3.43 percent on Monday.
Tinghsin to bid at auction
Tinghsin International Group (頂新集團), a China-based food conglomerate, has expressed interest in bidding for the Shin Kong Mitsukoshi A11 department store building, which has a NT$10 billion (US$295 million) price tag, the Chinese-language Economic Daily News reported yesterday.
An auction will be organized by the building’s owner, Shin Kong Life Insurance Co (新光人壽), on Friday afternoon.
In addition to Tinghsin, Cathay Life Insurance Co (國泰人壽), Taiwan Life Insurance Co (台灣人壽) and Fubon Insurance Co (富邦人壽) have all reportedly submitted bidding documents and applications to participate in the auction, which is likely to drive up the closing price to some NT$12 billion, or a 20 percent premium.
The building, located in Taipei’s Xinyi District (信義), sits on a 2,534 ping (8,377m²) parcel of land and has a total floor space of 19,205 ping (63,489m²), Shin Kong said.
Electricity prices compared
Retail electricity prices have remained at low levels despite drastic fluctuations in global fuel prices, a report released yesterday by state-run Taiwan Power Company (Taipower, 台電) said.
The report showed that the average retail price of electricity supplied to industrial consumers stood at NT$1.8331 per kilowatt-hour (kWh) in 2007, which was the third-lowest among 26 countries selected for comparison.
The price was higher than Norway’s NT$1.5052 per kWh and France’s NT$1.7560 per kWh, but significantly lower than South Korea’s NT$2.1637, Indonesia’s NT$2.1678, Malaysia’s NT$2.2201, Singapore’s NT$3.5121 and Japan’s NT$6.2404, the report said.
Computer makers add staff
Quanta Computer Inc (廣達電腦) and Compal Electronics Inc (仁寶電腦), the world’s two largest contract manufacturers of notebook computers, have increased staff numbers at their factories in China to meet a rebound in demand.
Compal has added about 9,000 production-line workers since January, making a total of 26,000, Chang Chih-ming (張志銘), a spokesman for the Taipei-based company said by phone yesterday. Output was running at about 80 percent of capacity, compared with about 60 percent in the fourth quarter, he said.
Quanta began hiring last month, spokesman Elton Yang (楊俊烈) said, without elaborating.
Meanwhile, Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) cut 116,000 people from its workforce during the fourth quarter as profits fell, company filings showed.
Hon Hai and its subsidiaries employed 486,000 people as of Dec. 31, 19 percent less than at the end of September.
NT dollar on the up
The New Taiwan dollar gained ground against its US counterpart on the Taipei Foreign Exchange yesterday, closing NT$0.098 higher at NT$33.917. Turnover was US$733 million.
WEAKER ACTIVITY: The sharpest deterioration was seen in the electronics and optical components sector, with the production index falling 13.2 points to 44.5 Taiwan’s manufacturing sector last month contracted for a second consecutive month, with the purchasing managers’ index (PMI) slipping to 48, reflecting ongoing caution over trade uncertainties, the Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research (CIER, 中華經濟研究院) said yesterday. The decline reflects growing caution among companies amid uncertainty surrounding US tariffs, semiconductor duties and automotive import levies, and it is also likely linked to fading front-loading activity, CIER president Lien Hsien-ming (連賢明) said. “Some clients have started shifting orders to Southeast Asian countries where tariff regimes are already clear,” Lien told a news conference. Firms across the supply chain are also lowering stock levels to mitigate
IN THE AIR: While most companies said they were committed to North American operations, some added that production and costs would depend on the outcome of a US trade probe Leading local contract electronics makers Wistron Corp (緯創), Quanta Computer Inc (廣達), Inventec Corp (英業達) and Compal Electronics Inc (仁寶) are to maintain their North American expansion plans, despite Washington’s 20 percent tariff on Taiwanese goods. Wistron said it has long maintained a presence in the US, while distributing production across Taiwan, North America, Southeast Asia and Europe. The company is in talks with customers to align capacity with their site preferences, a company official told the Taipei Times by telephone on Friday. The company is still in talks with clients over who would bear the tariff costs, with the outcome pending further
Six Taiwanese companies, including contract chipmaker Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), made the 2025 Fortune Global 500 list of the world’s largest firms by revenue. In a report published by New York-based Fortune magazine on Tuesday, Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), also known as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團), ranked highest among Taiwanese firms, placing 28th with revenue of US$213.69 billion. Up 60 spots from last year, TSMC rose to No. 126 with US$90.16 billion in revenue, followed by Quanta Computer Inc (廣達) at 348th, Pegatron Corp (和碩) at 461st, CPC Corp, Taiwan (台灣中油) at 494th and Wistron Corp (緯創) at
NEGOTIATIONS: Semiconductors play an outsized role in Taiwan’s industrial and economic development and are a major driver of the Taiwan-US trade imbalance With US President Donald Trump threatening to impose tariffs on semiconductors, Taiwan is expected to face a significant challenge, as information and communications technology (ICT) products account for more than 70 percent of its exports to the US, Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research (CIER, 中華經濟研究院) president Lien Hsien-ming (連賢明) said on Friday. Compared with other countries, semiconductors play a disproportionately large role in Taiwan’s industrial and economic development, Lien said. As the sixth-largest contributor to the US trade deficit, Taiwan recorded a US$73.9 billion trade surplus with the US last year — up from US$47.8 billion in 2023 — driven by strong
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