TAIEX climbs 1.63 percent
Share prices closed up 1.63 percent yesterday as investors hailed improving US jobs data, dealers said.
The TAIEX rose 124.73 points to 7,775.64 on turnover of NT$134.91 billion (US$4.19 billion).
The market opened 0.70 percent higher, vaulting the index past resistance at 7,700 points, and the momentum of large-cap stocks continued until the end of the session on optimism towards the global economic climate, dealers said.
Investors also shrugged off a setback suffered by the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) in Saturday’s local elections, they said.
“The election outcome had been expected by the market. The end of the vote cleared uncertainty,” Grand Cathay Securities (大華證券) analyst Mars Hsu said.
Institutional investors picked up large-cap high-tech stocks on hopes of growing global demand, dealers said.
“The buying into the bellwether electronic sector showed investors have shifted their attention back to economic fundamentals after the elections,” Hsu said.
Hon Hai targets Quanta laptops
Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), the world’s biggest contract maker of electronics, plans to buy Quanta Computer Inc’s (廣達電腦) laptop unit, the United Evening News reported on Sunday without saying where it got the information from.
The companies denied the report, the Chinese-language newspaper said. Quanta’s spokeswoman Carol Hsu (許昭瑾) denied the rumor and Hon Hai spokesman Edmund Ding (丁祈安) didn’t return calls seeking comment.
Meanwhile, SinoPac Financial Holdings Co (永豐金控) said it has no intentions or plans to acquire Bank International Ningbo (寧波銀行) in China, the Taipei-based lender said in an exchange filing yesterday.
The Chinese-language Commercial Times reported SinoPac Financial aims to acquire a 51 percent stake in the Chinese bank for NT$6 billion, citing unidentified people familiar with the plan.
Formosa invests in Nanya
Formosa Plastics Group (台塑集團), Taiwan’s biggest diversified industrial company, invested a total of NT$5.42 billion in group member Nanya Technology Corp (南亞科技) through three affiliates, their exchange statements said yesterday.
Formosa Chemicals and Fibre Corp (台灣化纖) invested NT$781 million, Formosa Plastics Corp (台塑) bought NT$764 million shares, while Nan Ya Plastics Corp (南亞塑膠) invested NT$3.87 billion. They paid NT$20 apiece for Nanya Technology’s shares.
Nanya Technology, Taiwan’s biggest maker of computer-memory chips, rose by its daily limit to close at NT$23.90 on the TAIEX yesterday, before the announcement.
Wealthy investors get richer
About 70 percent of affluent Chinese investors say they became wealthier during the last six months, helped by the global stock market rally, a survey conducted by Nielsen showed.
The number of Chinese respondents in the survey who reported an increase in their net worth climbed from 46 percent in June, said Bonnie Tse, the Hong Kong-based head of wealth management for Asia Pacific at HSBC Holdings PLC, which commissioned the survey.
The MSCI Asia Pacific Index has rallied 71 percent from a five-year low on March 9 after governments worldwide cut interest rates and pledged more than US$2 trillion in stimulus since September last year.
In India, the percentage of affluent respondents who said their wealth rose climbed to 68 percent from 28 percent six months ago.
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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