Tech sector boosts TAIEX
Share prices closed up 2.28 percent yesterday as buying focused on the high-tech sector after investors witnessed a strong showing on Wall Street overnight, dealers said.
The TAIEX closed up 164.57 points at 7,360.28, off a low of 7,309.46 and a high of 7,361.70, with turnover of NT$79.02 billion (US$2.45 billion).
A total of 2,319 stocks closed up and 622 down, with 245 unchanged.
FSC punishes brokerage
The Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC) yesterday imposed administrative punishments on 27 employees, including several executives, at Taiwan International Securities Corp (金鼎證券) for helping to promote sales of overseas funds worth US$15.53 million issued by Private Equity Management Group before regulatory approval had been granted.
The commission ordered the securities brokerage firm to immediately dismiss its vice president Fang Kuan-pao (房冠寶), an FSC press statement said.
Brokerage chairman Lawrence Chang (張元銘), who has been suspended since August for his leadership in another problematic sale of structured notes, will be suspended for another year starting from Aug. 5, the statement added.
The remaining 25 employees, including heads of the firm’s fund investment division, will be suspended for terms ranging from one to six months, the commission said.
More pay raises expected
Hon Hai Precision Industry Co’s (鴻海精密) and Honda Motor Co’s wage increases are just a prelude to more widespread wage increases among manufacturers, JPMorgan Chase & Co said in a report yesterday.
Daiwa-Cathay Capital Markets said on Wednesday that Foxconn’s (富士康) announcement of a 30 percent pay raise for its Chinese workers is expected to trigger a chain effect, prompting other Taiwanese investors to follow suit.
However, major Taiwanese notebook makers such as Compal Electronics Inc (仁寶電腦), Quanta Computer Inc (廣達電腦) and Wistron Corp (緯創) said yesterday they would not raise wages at their Chinese plants.
Trio plan Chinese LED venture
LG Display Co, AmTRAN Technology Co (瑞軒) and Everlight Electronics Co (億光) plan to invest US$30 million to form an LED packaging venture in Jiangsu Province, China, Taipei-based Everlight said in an exchange filing yesterday.
Everlight will invest US$18 million for a 60 percent stake, while LG Display and AmTRAN will invest US$6 million for a 20 percent stake each, according to the filing.
Older job seekers more active
More than 150,000 job vacancies are up for grabs for new graduates this month with a focus on sales, operations, customer service and finance-related positions, online manpower agency 104 Job Bank said in a report yesterday.
However, the agency’s analysis shows that 77 percent of veteran job seekers will apply for those jobs and that they are 1.5 times more active than fresh graduates when looking for work.
The agency’s public relations manager Max Fang (方光瑋) said job hunters with work experience submitted their resumes to prospective employers an average of 8.45 times in April, compared with 5.7 times for new graduates.
The report also showed that only 15.3 percent of enterprises said that they would “definitely” employ new graduates.
NT dollar edges higher
The New Taiwan dollar gained ground yesterday, rising NT$0.04 against the US dollar to close at NT$32.275.
Turnover was US$732 million.
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
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
RECORD-BREAKING: TSMC’s net profit last quarter beat market expectations by expanding 8.9% and it was the best first-quarter profit in the chipmaker’s history Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), which counts Nvidia Corp as a key customer, yesterday said that artificial intelligence (AI) server chip revenue is set to more than double this year from last year amid rising demand. The chipmaker expects the growth momentum to continue in the next five years with an annual compound growth rate of 50 percent, TSMC chief executive officer C.C. Wei (魏哲家) told investors yesterday. By 2028, AI chips’ contribution to revenue would climb to about 20 percent from a percentage in the low teens, Wei said. “Almost all the AI innovators are working with TSMC to address the
FUTURE PLANS: Although the electric vehicle market is getting more competitive, Hon Hai would stick to its goal of seizing a 5 percent share globally, Young Liu said Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), a major iPhone assembler and supplier of artificial intelligence (AI) servers powered by Nvidia Corp’s chips, yesterday said it has introduced a rotating chief executive structure as part of the company’s efforts to cultivate future leaders and to enhance corporate governance. The 50-year-old contract electronics maker reported sizable revenue of NT$6.16 trillion (US$189.67 billion) last year. Hon Hai, also known as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團), has been under the control of one man almost since its inception. A rotating CEO system is a rarity among Taiwanese businesses. Hon Hai has given leaders of the company’s six