TAIEX rises to one-month high
Taiwanese shares closed up 0.98 percent yesterday to a one-month high on strong buying in technology, financial and property stocks, dealers said.
The weighted index rose 65.31 points to 6,715.22 on turnover of NT$127.74 billion (US$3.99 billion), the highest since the June 6 close of 6,856.74.
Gainers led losers 1,447 to 797 with 159 stocks unchanged.
“Financial stocks have become the buying targets, given the current lack of mainstream leaders in the market,” KGI Securities (凱基證券) trader Bill Huang said.
The financial sector edged up 0.9 percent, led by news that investment bank China Development Financial Holdings Corp (中華開發金控) booked a disposal gain of about NT$860 million from selling its stake in Taipei Financial Center Corp (台北金融大樓公司), operator of the Taipei 101 skyscraper.
AUO’s June sales rose 9.6%
AU Optronics Corp (AUO, 友達光電), the world’s third-biggest maker of liquid-crystal-display (LCD) panels, yesterday said that sales last month reached their highest in eight months, another sign of recovery from the industry’s worst downturn.
Last month, AUO posted NT$30.4 billion (US$922 million) in revenues, up 9.6 percent from NT$27.7 billion in May. On an annual basis, however, sales were down 17.3 percent.
Second-quarter sales reached NT$82.5 billion, up 62.6 percent from the first quarter. Compared with the same period last year, they were down 33.2 percent.
Shipments of PC and TV panels jumped more than 70 percent quarter-on-quarter to 22.41 million units in the April-to-June quarter, surpassing the company’s estimate of a 50 percent increase made in late April.
AUO said shipments last month were limited by a shortage of glass substrates.
Quanta loses patent suit
Quanta Computer Inc (廣達), the world’s largest maker of notebook computers, must pay US$52 million for infringing a patent covering technology for identifying the type of disk inserted into a disk drive, a jury said.
The federal jury in Marshall, Texas, deliberated about four hours on Monday before finding Quanta willfully infringed the patent of LaserDynamics and awarded the damages.
Based in Kanagawa-Ken, Japan, LaserDynamics sued in 2006, claiming Quanta and Asustek Computer Inc (華碩) imported and sold DVD players that used its patent. Asustek earlier settled with LaserDynamics.
Quanta said it would appeal the verdict.
Energy use drops in May
The nation’s energy consumption declined for the 11th straight month in May because of reduced demand from manufacturers amid the global recession.
Consumption of coal, petroleum, gas, thermal energy and electricity dropped 10 percent from a year earlier to the equivalent of 9.61 million kiloliters of oil, or about 1.95 million barrels a day, the Bureau of Energy said in an e-mailed report yesterday.
Industrial users slashed energy use by 14 percent, it said.
Consumption of petroleum products fell 6.4 percent from a year earlier to the equivalent of 4.47 million kiloliters of oil in May, the bureau said.
Natural gas use dropped 2.1 percent to 110.2 million cubic meters and coal consumption declined 12 percent to 5.06 million tonnes, it said.
NT dollar weakens
The New Taiwan dollar declined NT$0.001 to close at NT$32.989 against the US dollar on turnover of US$827 million at the Taipei Foreign Exchange yesterday.
SEMICONDUCTORS: The German laser and plasma generator company will expand its local services as its specialized offerings support Taiwan’s semiconductor industries Trumpf SE + Co KG, a global leader in supplying laser technology and plasma generators used in chip production, is expanding its investments in Taiwan in an effort to deeply integrate into the global semiconductor supply chain in the pursuit of growth. The company, headquartered in Ditzingen, Germany, has invested significantly in a newly inaugurated regional technical center for plasma generators in Taoyuan, its latest expansion in Taiwan after being engaged in various industries for more than 25 years. The center, the first of its kind Trumpf built outside Germany, aims to serve customers from Taiwan, Japan, Southeast Asia and South Korea,
POWERING UP: PSUs for AI servers made up about 50% of Delta’s total server PSU revenue during the first three quarters of last year, the company said Power supply and electronic components maker Delta Electronics Inc (台達電) reported record-high revenue of NT$161.61 billion (US$5.11 billion) for last quarter and said it remains positive about this quarter. Last quarter’s figure was up 7.6 percent from the previous quarter and 41.51 percent higher than a year earlier, and largely in line with Yuanta Securities Investment Consulting Co’s (元大投顧) forecast of NT$160 billion. Delta’s annual revenue last year rose 31.76 percent year-on-year to NT$554.89 billion, also a record high for the company. Its strong performance reflected continued demand for high-performance power solutions and advanced liquid-cooling products used in artificial intelligence (AI) data centers,
Gasoline and diesel prices at domestic fuel stations are to fall NT$0.2 per liter this week, down for a second consecutive week, CPC Corp, Taiwan (台灣中油) and Formosa Petrochemical Corp (台塑石化) announced yesterday. Effective today, gasoline prices at CPC and Formosa stations are to drop to NT$26.4, NT$27.9 and NT$29.9 per liter for 92, 95 and 98-octane unleaded gasoline respectively, the companies said in separate statements. The price of premium diesel is to fall to NT$24.8 per liter at CPC stations and NT$24.6 at Formosa pumps, they said. The price adjustments came even as international crude oil prices rose last week, as traders
SIZE MATTERS: TSMC started phasing out 8-inch wafer production last year, while Samsung is more aggressively retiring 8-inch capacity, TrendForce said Chipmakers are expected to raise prices of 8-inch wafers by up to 20 percent this year on concern over supply constraints as major contract chipmakers Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) and Samsung Electronics Co gradually retire less advanced wafer capacity, TrendForce Corp (集邦科技) said yesterday. It is the first significant across-the-board price hike since a global semiconductor correction in 2023, the Taipei-based market researcher said in a report. Global 8-inch wafer capacity slid 0.3 percent year-on-year last year, although 8-inch wafer prices still hovered at relatively stable levels throughout the year, TrendForce said. The downward trend is expected to continue this year,
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