Share prices slip
Share prices closed lower yesterday, with the TAIEX falling 14.45 points, or 0.17 percent, to close at 8,309.37.
The bourse opened at 8,343.73 and traded between 8,356.97 and 8,262.58 during the session.
A total of 5.25 billion shares changed hands on market turnover of NT$147.14 billion (US$4.63 billion).
Losers outnumbered gainers 1,698 to 1,379, with 282 remaining unchanged.
Acer wins Gold Tech Award
Acer Inc’s (宏碁) desktop Aspire RevoR3600 yesterday bagged the top award at the 2009 Gold Tech Awards — an annual ceremony organized by Cite Media Holding Group (城邦媒體) magazines including PC Home.
Apple Inc’s iPhone 3GS, retailed by Chunghwa Telecom Co (中華電信), as well as a mouse from Leader Media Development Inc (利德開發), won the best design and best innovation categories.
The awards are aimed at providing consumers with a list of the most popular and most innovative tech gadgets of the year, the organizer said. The magazines’ editors and a panel judges from the tech industry chose the winners.
In the “popularity” category, which allowed Internet users to vote, Gigabyte Technology Co (技嘉科技) won with its hybrid Booktop M1022x model.
Chinatrust reports profit drop
Chinatrust Financial Holding Co (中信金控), Taiwan’s fourth-largest listed financial services company by market value, said profit last year fell 77.3 percent after it increased provisions.
Net income fell to NT$3.34 billion, or NT$0.25 per share, the Taipei-based company said in an exchange filing, revising an earlier report yesterday of net income of NT$3.93 billion. The company posted net income of NT$14.7 billion, or NT$1.51 a share, in 2008.
Chinatrust said the drop in profit last year was a result of the global financial crisis, lower interest rates and increased provisions.
Chunghwa buys bonds
Chunghwa Telecom Co (中華電信) bought a total of NT$1.48 billion in corporate bonds, the Taipei-based company said in three exchange filings yesterday.
Chunghwa bought NT$617 million in Formosa Petrochemical Corp (台塑石化) bonds, NT$406 million in Yuanta Securities Finance Co (元大證金) bonds and NT$459 million in Taiwan Power Co (台電) bonds, it said.
Fubon Bank raising funds
Fubon Financial Holding Co (富邦金控) said on Monday its banking unit would issue NT$2.25 billion in seven-year and NT$2.4 billion in 10-year subordinated debentures for long-term funding.
Taipei Fubon Commercial Bank (台北富邦銀行) will also use the proceeds to improve its capital adequacy ratio, Fubon Financial said in a statement.
The coupon for the seven-year subordinated debentures is 2.2 percent and 2.5 percent for the 10-year debentures, it said.
US trade deficit up 9.7 percent
The US trade deficit rose to the highest level in 10 months as an improving economy helped demand for imports. However, exports rose as well, boosted by a weaker dollar, supporting the view that US manufacturers will be helped by a rebounding global economy.
The Commerce Department reported yesterday that the trade deficit jumped 9.7 percent to US$36.4 billion in November, a bigger imbalance than the US$34.5 billion deficit economists had forecast.
Exports rose 0.9 percent, the seventh consecutive gain, as demand was up for US-made autos, farm products and industrial machinery. Imports rose at a much faster 2.6 percent, led by a 7.3 percent rise in petroleum imports.
Taiwan Transport and Storage Corp (TTS, 台灣通運倉儲) yesterday unveiled its first electric tractor unit — manufactured by Volvo Trucks — in a ceremony in Taipei, and said the unit would soon be used to transport cement produced by Taiwan Cement Corp (TCC, 台灣水泥). Both TTS and TCC belong to TCC International Holdings Ltd (台泥國際集團). With the electric tractor unit, the Taipei-based cement firm would become the first in Taiwan to use electric vehicles to transport construction materials. TTS chairman Koo Kung-yi (辜公怡), Volvo Trucks vice president of sales and marketing Johan Selven, TCC president Roman Cheng (程耀輝) and Taikoo Motors Group
Stephen Garrett, a 27-year-old graduate student, always thought he would study in China, but first the country’s restrictive COVID-19 policies made it nearly impossible and now he has other concerns. The cost is one deterrent, but Garrett is more worried about restrictions on academic freedom and the personal risk of being stranded in China. He is not alone. Only about 700 American students are studying at Chinese universities, down from a peak of nearly 25,000 a decade ago, while there are nearly 300,000 Chinese students at US schools. Some young Americans are discouraged from investing their time in China by what they see
MAJOR DROP: CEO Tim Cook, who is visiting Hanoi, pledged the firm was committed to Vietnam after its smartphone shipments declined 9.6% annually in the first quarter Apple Inc yesterday said it would increase spending on suppliers in Vietnam, a key production hub, as CEO Tim Cook arrived in the country for a two-day visit. The iPhone maker announced the news in a statement on its Web site, but gave no details of how much it would spend or where the money would go. Cook is expected to meet programmers, content creators and students during his visit, online newspaper VnExpress reported. The visit comes as US President Joe Biden’s administration seeks to ramp up Vietnam’s role in the global tech supply chain to reduce the US’ dependence on China. Images on
New apartments in Taiwan’s major cities are getting smaller, while old apartments are increasingly occupied by older people, many of whom live alone, government data showed. The phenomenon has to do with sharpening unaffordable property prices and an aging population, property brokers said. Apartments with one bedroom that are two years old or older have gained a noticeable presence in the nation’s six special municipalities as well as Hsinchu county and city in the past five years, Evertrust Rehouse Co (永慶房產集團) found, citing data from the government’s real-price transaction platform. In Taipei, apartments with one bedroom accounted for 19 percent of deals last