Five major telecoms operators from Taiwan and China signed a contract yesterday to build the first undersea cable directly linking Taiwan and China to meet mounting demand, officials said.
Chang Xiaobing (常小兵), chairman of China Unicom (中國聯通), signed the contract at a ceremony in Taipei that also included representatives from Chunghwa Telecom Co (中華電信) and three other leading Taiwanese telecoms operators.
Under the contract, pending the Taiwanese government’s final approval, a 220km undersea cable will link Tamsui with China’s Fuzhou city.
If the project is realized, the cable will become the first of its kind since 1949.
Two other Chinese telecoms operators will sign the contract, thought to be worth about NT$800 million (US$26 million), at a later date.
“Clients’ demand for Internet and audio-video transmission from the two sides are very strong,” an official at Chunghua Telecom said.
Demand is expected to surge in the years ahead as Chinese telecoms operators press for third-generation mobile communications and as cloud computing — whereby shared resources, software and information are hosted online — moves up telecoms operators’ development agendas.
The undersea cable project comes amid fast-warming ties between Taiwan and China under China-friendly President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九), who took office in May 2008 on promises to boost economic ties between the two.
The US dollar was trading at NT$29.7 at 10am today on the Taipei Foreign Exchange, as the New Taiwan dollar gained NT$1.364 from the previous close last week. The NT dollar continued to rise today, after surging 3.07 percent on Friday. After opening at NT$30.91, the NT dollar gained more than NT$1 in just 15 minutes, briefly passing the NT$30 mark. Before the US Department of the Treasury's semi-annual currency report came out, expectations that the NT dollar would keep rising were already building. The NT dollar on Friday closed at NT$31.064, up by NT$0.953 — a 3.07 percent single-day gain. Today,
‘SHORT TERM’: The local currency would likely remain strong in the near term, driven by anticipated US trade pressure, capital inflows and expectations of a US Fed rate cut The US dollar is expected to fall below NT$30 in the near term, as traders anticipate increased pressure from Washington for Taiwan to allow the New Taiwan dollar to appreciate, Cathay United Bank (國泰世華銀行) chief economist Lin Chi-chao (林啟超) said. Following a sharp drop in the greenback against the NT dollar on Friday, Lin told the Central News Agency that the local currency is likely to remain strong in the short term, driven in part by market psychology surrounding anticipated US policy pressure. On Friday, the US dollar fell NT$0.953, or 3.07 percent, closing at NT$31.064 — its lowest level since Jan.
The New Taiwan dollar and Taiwanese stocks surged on signs that trade tensions between the world’s top two economies might start easing and as US tech earnings boosted the outlook of the nation’s semiconductor exports. The NT dollar strengthened as much as 3.8 percent versus the US dollar to 30.815, the biggest intraday gain since January 2011, closing at NT$31.064. The benchmark TAIEX jumped 2.73 percent to outperform the region’s equity gauges. Outlook for global trade improved after China said it is assessing possible trade talks with the US, providing a boost for the nation’s currency and shares. As the NT dollar
The Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC) yesterday met with some of the nation’s largest insurance companies as a skyrocketing New Taiwan dollar piles pressure on their hundreds of billions of dollars in US bond investments. The commission has asked some life insurance firms, among the biggest Asian holders of US debt, to discuss how the rapidly strengthening NT dollar has impacted their operations, people familiar with the matter said. The meeting took place as the NT dollar jumped as much as 5 percent yesterday, its biggest intraday gain in more than three decades. The local currency surged as exporters rushed to
RSS