TAIEX declines amid caution
The TAIEX closed little changed in thin trade yesterday as investors turned more cautious after Wall Street incurred further losses overnight amid concerns over the global economy, dealers said.
The benchmark index fell 6.59 points, or 0.07 percent, to 9,000.94 after moving between 8,996.08 and 9,045.44, on turnover of NT$79.58 billion (US$2.77 billion).
Hon Hai shares continue rally
Shares of Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海) extended their momentum yesterday after the company gave an optimistic assessment of its outlook at its annual general meeting held a day earlier, dealers said.
Hon Hai chairman Terry Gou (郭台銘) told the company’s shareholders that he expects the company to generate a 15 percent to 30 percent increase in sales this year, compared with about NT$2.9 trillion recorded last year.
Gou said Hon Hai is determined to enter the solar energy business in the second half of this year, while it is also considering development of cloud computing technologies in the future.
Largan set to branch out
Largan Precision Co (大立光), the nation’s largest smartphone camera lens maker, is diversifying into sectors such as smart TVs, games consoles and the medical industry for future growth momentum.
CEO Lin En-ping (林恩平) told a shareholders’ meeting yesterday that the company has started to extend its tentacles into these areas as long as the product margins stay within the industry average.
However, smartphones and tablets remain its two major focus sectors this year thanks to their exponential growth, he said.
The meeting also approved the board’s proposal to distribute a record NT13.5 cash dividend per share to shareholders.
Formosa sells 5-year bonds
Formosa Petrochemical Corp (台塑石化), the nation’s second--largest oil refiner, sold NT$6 billion of five-year unsecured bonds at an interest rate of 1.49 percent, the company said in an exchange filing yesterday. The proceeds will be used to repay short-term debt and improve its financial structure, the company said.
Sampo secures NT$2.4b loans
Sampo Corp (聲寶), one of the nation’s leading home appliance makers, signed NT$2.4 billion of three-year syndicated loans with local financial companies including Bank of Taiwan (臺灣銀行), the borrower said in a statement to the Taiwan Stock Exchange yesterday.
The funds will be used to repay debts and replenish working capital, Sampo said.
Tablets stunting PC growth
Research firm Gartner lowered its view on global PC market growth for this year, saying consumers in developed markets were choosing tablets like Apple’s iPad over small laptops.
Gartner said on Wednesday it now expected the PC market to grow 9.3 percent this year, down from the 10.5 percent it previously forecast, because of economic uncertainties as well as a lack of compelling PC products.
“Mini-notebook shipments have noticeably contracted over the last several quarters,” said Ranjit Atwal, research director at Gartner. “Media tablets, such as the iPad, have also impacted mobile growth.”
Top vendors of mini-notebooks, such as Acer Inc (宏碁) and Asustek Computer Inc (華碩), have suffered in recent quarters from the shift.
NT dollar falls NT$0.06
The New Taiwan dollar fell NT$0.06 against the greenback yesterday, to close at NT$28.780.
Turnover totaled US$904 million during the trading session.
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
Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 0.7 percent and 13.6 percent respectively from a year earlier, setting record highs for the month of March, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Sales in the wholesale sector also grew last month by 4.6 annually, mainly due to the business opportunities for emerging applications related to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing technologies, the ministry said in a report. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales this month would retain their growth momentum as the former would benefit from Tomb Sweeping Day