TAIEX gains on mixed results
Trading saw mixed results yesterday with the rise of the NT dollar against the US dollar dampening interest in electronics stocks, but boosting asset-backed shares, dealers said.
The TAIEX edged up 1.92 points, or 0.02 percent, to 8,246.1 after moving between 8,240.67 and 8,300.04 on turnover of NT$138.29 billion (US$4.46 billion).
The market opened up 0.2 percent as the stronger NT dollar boosted asset-backed shares and briefly pushed the index above the key 8,300 level.
Worried, however, that the appreciation of the NT dollar would affect sales of Taiwan’s -export-oriented electronics vendors, investors started unloading their holdings of electronics companies that are expected to release last month’s sales figures this week.
A total of 1,755 stocks closed up and 2,301 finished down, with 225 remaining unchanged.
Epistar’s plans LED investment
Epistar Corp (晶電) said its board approved plans to invest US$70 million into China’s KFES Lighting (Xiamen) Co to manufacture LED chips and modules, the -Hsinchu-based company said in a filing to the Taiwan Stock Exchange yesterday.
Yea Shin approves bond sale
Yea Shin International Development Co’s (亞昕國際開發) board of directors approved a plan to sell NT$500 million in three-year secured domestic convertible bonds at zero coupon, the Taipei-based company said in a statement to the stock exchange yesterday.
The proceeds will be used to repay bank loans, the company said, adding that the Land Bank of Taiwan (臺灣土地銀行) will guarantee the bond issue.
First Bank to issue debentures
First Commercial Bank’s (第一銀行) board of directors approved a plan to sell NT$10 billion of debentures with maturity of up to 10 years, parent company First -Financial -Holding Co (第一金控) said in statement to the stock exchange yesterday. The proceeds will be used to strengthen its tier-one and tier-two capital, maintain capital adequacy ratio and help meet medium to long-term funding needs, it said.
QST’s board okays bond sale
QST International Corp’s (友信國際) board approved a plan to sell NT$200 million of three-year secured domestic convertible bonds at zero coupon, the Tainan-based company said in a statement to the stock exchange on Sunday. The proceeds will be used to repay bank loans, it said.
Chinatrust Commercial Bank (中國信託商銀) and Taishin International Bank (台新銀行) will guarantee the bond issue.
Acter okays 4.6m new shares
Acter Co’s (聖暉工程科技) board of directors approved a plan to offer 4.6 million new shares tentatively priced at NT$70 each, the company said in a statement to the stock exchange yesterday.
The proceeds will be used to strengthen working capital, the Taichung-based maker of electric and bio-medical facilities said.
Dragon Steel buys equipment
China Steel Corp (中鋼), Taiwan’s largest steelmaker, said its subsidiary Dragon Steel Corp (中龍鋼鐵) bought NT$2.4 billion of equipment from Nippon Steel Engineering Corp on Friday, the Kaohsiung-based company said in a statement to the stock exchange yesterday.
Wintek’s gross sales rise
Wintek Corp (勝華科技), a major touch panel supplier for the iPhone, yesterday said its consolidated gross sales for last month totaled NT$7.7 billion, representing an increase of NT$1.5 billion, or 24.9 percent, from NT$6.2 billion in August.
For this year, consolidated gross sales amounted to NT$39.8 billion, compared with the NT$18.4 billion from the same period last year.
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
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”
TRANSFORMATION: Taiwan is now home to the largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, thanks to the nation’s economic policies President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday attended an event marking the opening of Google’s second hardware research and development (R&D) office in Taiwan, which was held at New Taipei City’s Banciao District (板橋). This signals Taiwan’s transformation into the world’s largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, validating the nation’s economic policy in the past eight years, she said. The “five plus two” innovative industries policy, “six core strategic industries” initiative and infrastructure projects have grown the national industry and established resilient supply chains that withstood the COVID-19 pandemic, Tsai said. Taiwan has improved investment conditions of the domestic economy
MAJOR BENEFICIARY: The company benefits from TSMC’s advanced packaging scarcity, given robust demand for Nvidia AI chips, analysts said ASE Technology Holding Co (ASE, 日月光投控), the world’s biggest chip packaging and testing service provider, yesterday said it is raising its equipment capital expenditure budget by 10 percent this year to expand leading-edge and advanced packing and testing capacity amid strong artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing chip demand. This is on top of the 40 to 50 percent annual increase in its capital spending budget to more than the US$1.7 billion to announced in February. About half of the equipment capital expenditure would be spent on leading-edge and advanced packaging and testing technology, the company said. ASE is considered by analysts