Taobao, Yahoo Japan ink deal
Taobao (淘寶網), China’s largest retail Web site, and Yahoo Japan yesterday announced new online platforms that will allow merchants on their respective sites to sell products in both markets.
Under the partnership, Yahoo Japan merchants will list around 8 million items in a special Chinese-language TaoJapan section, giving them access to more than 190 million Taobao users, the companies said.
Online stores at Taobao will be able to offer about 50 million products from China to Japanese consumers at Yahoo Japan’s China Mall, they said in a statement.
The new services, available from June 1, will allow Internet users in both countries to buy and sell using systems and procedures that are familiar to them in their native languages, it said.
“We expect that the Asian economy will continue to grow further, led mainly by China and Japan, and that the Internet business and e-commerce business will be the core of that growth,” said Masayoshi Son, chief executive of SoftBank, Yahoo Japan’s biggest shareholder with a 41 percent stake.
Taobao is a unit of China’s largest e-commerce company, Alibaba Group (阿里巴巴), in which both SoftBank and US Internet companies Yahoo are shareholders. Alibaba Group’s Hong Kong-listed subsidiary Alibaba.com already has a joint venture with SoftBank called Alibaba.com Japan.
TAIEX gains 1.29 percent
Share prices closed higher in Taipei yesterday, with the TAIEX moving up 97.63 points, or 1.29 percent, to close at 7,664.73.
The bourse opened at 7,610.88 and fluctuated between a low of 7,577.31 and a high of 7,664.73 during the day’s trading. Market turnover totaled NT$90.47 billion (US$2.87 billion).
All eight major stock categories gained ground, with cement issues gaining the most at 2.63 percent, followed by construction shares at 2.32 percent. Foreign investors and Chinese qualified domestic institutional investors were net sellers of NT$ 9.14 billion in shares.
Chinatrust Holding profits up
Chinatrust Financial Holding Co (中信金) yesterday reported NT$1.9 billion in pre-tax profits for last month, up 14 percent month-on-month, the company said in a press statement.
Net profit in the first four months of this year reached NT$5.335 billion, or NT$0.54 per share, the statement added.
Meanwhile, Cathay Finanicial Holding Co (國泰金控) yesterday reported NT$40 million in net profit for last month, according to a company press statement.
However, the company incurred a net loss of NT$1.28 billion in the first four months of this year, or a loss of NT$0.13 per share, after its life insurance subsidiary posted NT$4.95 billion in net losses at the same time, the statement said.
NT gain biggest in 11 months
The New Taiwan dollar gained the most in 11 months on optimism a loan package to end a sovereign-debt crisis in Europe will bolster investors’ confidence in emerging-market assets as Asia leads a global economic recovery.
The currency strengthened for the first time in four days.
“The euro is stronger, so sentiment is better,” said Janet Lin, a foreign-exchange trader in Taipei at Taiwan Business Bank (台灣企銀). “The market is still volatile and the central bank is in the market every day.”
The NT dollar advanced 0.8 percent to NT$31.60 against its US counterpart as of the 4pm close, according to Taipei Forex Inc. The currency, which has climbed 1.6 percent this year, may trade between NT$31.62 and NT$31.90 this week, Lin said.
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