HTC plunges on target cuts
Shares of Taiwanese smartphone manufacturer HTC Corp (宏達電) extended their losses yesterday, falling below NT$500 after foreign brokerages cut their target price for the stock in the wake of the company’s gloomy forecast for the fourth quarter, dealers said.
The foreign brokerages included Goldman Sachs, Citigroup Global Markets, UBS Securities, Macquarie Securities and Morgan Stanley.
The market’s expanded turnover shows that many institutional investors, especially foreign ones, scrambled to lower their holdings after HTC cut its sales forecast for the October-December period to NT$104 billion (US$3.41 billion), from its previous estimated range of NT$125 billion to NT$135 billion, they said.
HTC closed limit-down, or 7 percent, for a second day at NT$489.50, with 39.03 million shares changing hands.
Vibo capital cut approved
Telecoms operator Vibo Telecoms Inc (威寶電信) yesterday said shareholders had approved a proposal to cut its share capital by 66 percent to NT$6.73 billion from NT$19.53 billion, the company said in a filing to the Taiwan Stock Exchange.
In the first half of this year, Vibo’s losses widened to NT$1.18 billion from losses of NT$866 million a year ago.
Nan Ya gains from land sale
Nan Ya Plastics Corp (南亞塑膠), the world’s fourth-largest ethylene glycol producer, may gain NT$254 million from selling land in Taoyuan County for NT$595 million, the company said in a statement to the Taiwan Stock Exchange yesterday.
Yulon to set up investment arm
Yulon Motor Co (裕隆汽車), one of the nation’s major carmakers, plans to invest US$150 million to form a new investment unit in China, the company said in a statement to the Taiwan Stock Exchange yesterday.
Chow Tai Fook IPO may be big
Chow Tai Fook Jewellery Group Ltd (周大福珠寶) could raise up to US$2.83 billion, which would be the biggest Hong Kong initial public offering (IPO) of the year, by tapping volatile equity markets to fund the purchase of diamonds and gold and pay down debt.
The Hong Kong-based company will offer 1.05 billion shares at HK$15 to HK$21 each, putting the total deal size at up to HK$22.05 billion (US$2.83 billion), two sources with direct knowledge of the deal said yesterday. The sources could not be named because details of the deal have yet to be made public information.
The IPO, one of the most anticipated of the year because of its size and the wide brand recognition of Chow Tai Fook in the Greater China market, would value the company at about US$27 billion, nearly three times the size of US jeweler Tiffany & Co.
Weak Euro impacts NT dollar
The New Taiwan dollar fell against the US dollar yesterday, shedding NT$0.018 to close at NT$30.46, as investors took cues from a weak euro, dealers said.
The weakness of the euro, which led most of the currencies in Asia in trending lower against the greenback, reflected ongoing worries over the eurozone’s ability to deal with the debt crisis, they said.
In addition, foreign investors sold a net NT$9.12 billion in shares on the local bourse, which kept the NT dollar under pressure throughout the session, dealers said.
Turnover totaled US$856 million.
Stephen Garrett, a 27-year-old graduate student, always thought he would study in China, but first the country’s restrictive COVID-19 policies made it nearly impossible and now he has other concerns. The cost is one deterrent, but Garrett is more worried about restrictions on academic freedom and the personal risk of being stranded in China. He is not alone. Only about 700 American students are studying at Chinese universities, down from a peak of nearly 25,000 a decade ago, while there are nearly 300,000 Chinese students at US schools. Some young Americans are discouraged from investing their time in China by what they see
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
MAJOR DROP: CEO Tim Cook, who is visiting Hanoi, pledged the firm was committed to Vietnam after its smartphone shipments declined 9.6% annually in the first quarter Apple Inc yesterday said it would increase spending on suppliers in Vietnam, a key production hub, as CEO Tim Cook arrived in the country for a two-day visit. The iPhone maker announced the news in a statement on its Web site, but gave no details of how much it would spend or where the money would go. Cook is expected to meet programmers, content creators and students during his visit, online newspaper VnExpress reported. The visit comes as US President Joe Biden’s administration seeks to ramp up Vietnam’s role in the global tech supply chain to reduce the US’ dependence on China. Images on
New apartments in Taiwan’s major cities are getting smaller, while old apartments are increasingly occupied by older people, many of whom live alone, government data showed. The phenomenon has to do with sharpening unaffordable property prices and an aging population, property brokers said. Apartments with one bedroom that are two years old or older have gained a noticeable presence in the nation’s six special municipalities as well as Hsinchu county and city in the past five years, Evertrust Rehouse Co (永慶房產集團) found, citing data from the government’s real-price transaction platform. In Taipei, apartments with one bedroom accounted for 19 percent of deals last