Apple suppliers lead fall
Lingering concerns over a possible capital gains tax on stock investments continued to weigh on the local bourse yesterday, with the TAIEX reversing an early trade upswing to close in negative territory, dealers said.
Selling focused on high-tech stocks, in particular on firms in Apple Inc’s supply chain, which were boosted by the US consumer electronics giant’s strong first-quarter results as investors rushed to pocket profits, they said.
The TAIEX closed down 41.83 points, or 0.55 percent, at 7,521.35, after fluctuating between 7,509.88 and 7,600.45, on turnover of NT$68.78 billion (US$2.34 billion).
At the end of the session, the machinery and electronics sector had suffered the heaviest losses among the eight major stock categories, finishing down 1.1 percent.
Bucking the decline on the broader market, foodstuffs rose 0.5 percent and plastics and chemicals gained 0.2 percent.
China Development in China
China Development Financial Holding Corp (中華開發金控) yesterday opened a financial leasing company in the city of Kunshan in China’s Jiangsu Province.
The financial leasing unit — CDIB International Leasing (中華開發國際租賃) — is China Development Financial’s first foothold in China and will extend its reach to neighboring cities such as Shanghai, Nanjing and Hangzhou in an initial phase, hoping to break even next year and turn a profit in 2014, it said.
Over the next five years, the financial leasing company will raise its capital to US$250 million from the current US$20 million in a bid to provide a wider range of services to small and medium-sized corporate clients.
Apple reseller expands further
Studio A Inc (晶實科技), the largest chain of Apple resellers in the nation, opened its first store in Greater Taichung on Wednesday as part of its national expansion plan.
Studio A is eyeing the purchasing power of consumers in the central city and also plans to set up stores in Hsinchu and Greater Tainan, the company said.
Studio A opened 30 stores across the nation in four years and moved into Hong Kong, China and South Korea in 2010.
The company said it aims to establish more than 100 stores in the Greater China area.
IBM initiates research project
IBM announced a joint research project on an integrated-circuit design with Taiwan’s Academia Sinica and National Taiwan University on Wednesday, which aims to apply the technology in the field of medicine.
The goal of the open collaborative research project is to develop a type of integrated circuit called optimized field programmable gate arrays (FPGA) and use it in cancer radiotherapy and tumor detection, IBM Taiwan said.
With the use of such technology, hopefully the course of cancer treatment will be shortened, IBM Taiwan said.
UMC bonds on sale next month
United Microelectronics Corp (UMC, 聯電), the world’s No 2 contract chipmaker, plans to sell NT$7.5 billion of five-year bonds, NT$5 billion of seven-year bonds and NT$2.5 billion of 10-year bonds in an auction on May 7, according to three people familiar with the matter.
UMC said in a statement to the Taiwan Stock Exchange on Wednesday it planned to use the proceeds to expand production capacity using advanced technologies.
Bernanke boosts NT dollar
The New Taiwan dollar rose to a three-week high after US Federal Reserve Chairman Ben Bernanke said more US stimulus measures would be available if necessary, boosting demand for riskier assets.
The NT dollar rose 0.4 percent to NT$29.412 against its US counterpart, according to Taipei Forex Inc.
The currency was trading at a three-week high of NT$29.353 before trimming the advance on speculation the central bank sought to curb gains, according to two traders who declined to be identified.
“Bernanke’s comments spurred risk-taking today,” said Samson Tu (涂韶鈺), a Taipei-based fund manager at Uni-President Assets Management Corp (統一投信), who helps manage US$1.6 billion of fixed-income securities.
“It’s boosting the Taiwan dollar and regional currencies,” he said.
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
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
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],”
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