TAIEX rallies on tech growth
The TAIEX staged a rally in expanded trade yesterday as investors were cheered by sales growth last month reported by select high-tech firms, in particular those in the Apple Inc’s supply chain, dealers said. Buying also spread to the financial sector on hopes of increasing cross-Taiwan Strait financial exchanges ahead of the signing of an investment protection agreement between Taiwan and China scheduled for later in the day, they said.
The weighted index closed up 113.90 points, or 1.56 percent, at 7,433.70, on turnover of NT$107.77 billion (US$3.60 billion). The turnover hit the highest level since May 2, when trading volume stood at NT$130.44 billion.
Government mulls ATM cards
The government is considering the possibility of allowing the use of locally issued automated teller machine (ATM) cards to make withdrawals in Chinese yuan in China, Financial Supervisory Commission Vice Chairwoman Lee Jih-chu (李紀珠) said Thursday.
The commission is in talks with Chinese financial authorities to set up a fund flow platform to pave the way for yuan withdrawals, as the two sides are aiming to establish a currency settlement mechanism to facilitate fund flows across the Taiwan Strait, Lee said on the sidelines of a forum on cross-strait banking exchanges.
Taipower predicts higher losses
State-run Taiwan Power Co (Taipower, 台電) said on Wednesday its losses for the second half of the year will be NT$5.25 billion (US$175.21 million) higher than it forecast earlier this year prior to fuel price hikes.
As state-run oil refiner CPC Corp, Taiwan (CPC, 台灣中油) raised its natural gas and fuel prices 3.03 percent and 4.25 percent respectively for this month, the utility company has estimated that its accumulated losses will have increased to NT$206.9 billion by the end of the year, Taipower spokesman Roger Lee (李鴻洲) said.
Taipower’s losses improved markedly in June after the government implemented the first in a series of phased hikes in electricity rates. Its May losses reached NT$16.5 billion, while the figure plummeted to just NT$9.74 billion for June.
Manufacturers join trade show
Taiwanese bicycle manufacturers will display their products at the upcoming Eurobike 2012, the world’s biggest bicycle trade show, in Friedrichshafen, Germany, the organizer said yesterday.
A total of 232 Taiwanese exhibitors among 1,200 participants from 50 countries will exhibit their latest bicycles and related products at this year’s event, which runs from Aug. 29 to Sept. 1, said Messe Friedrichshafen, the organizing body.
Acer sticks to Windows 8
Acer Inc (宏碁) chairman Wang Jeng-tang (王振堂) yesterday said the company is still planning to launch new tablet computers running on Microsoft Corp’s Windows 8 system, despite direct competition from the software giant’s “Surface” tablet, which will go on sale in October.
“I feel that they [Microsoft] are also figuring out ways to reduce the negative impact,” Wang told reporters on the sidelines of a conference in Taipei held by the Asian Productivity Organization.
“We’ve kept an eye on their pricing and channel strategies,” he said. “The impact will be great if their tablet is priced as low as US$199, like the Kindle Fire. The impact will be smaller if it is priced at US$599 or US$499.”
NT dollar rises
The New Taiwan dollar rose against the US dollar yesterday, adding NT$0.047 to close at NT$29.940. Turnover totaled US$729 million during the trading session.
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
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
RECORD-BREAKING: TSMC’s net profit last quarter beat market expectations by expanding 8.9% and it was the best first-quarter profit in the chipmaker’s history Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), which counts Nvidia Corp as a key customer, yesterday said that artificial intelligence (AI) server chip revenue is set to more than double this year from last year amid rising demand. The chipmaker expects the growth momentum to continue in the next five years with an annual compound growth rate of 50 percent, TSMC chief executive officer C.C. Wei (魏哲家) told investors yesterday. By 2028, AI chips’ contribution to revenue would climb to about 20 percent from a percentage in the low teens, Wei said. “Almost all the AI innovators are working with TSMC to address the
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],”