Cathay Financial Holding Co (國泰金控) yesterday said that the nation’s economy would grow 2.93 percent next year, but added that the public may not feel the benefit of the increase as manufacturers fill their export orders abroad.
The forecast is better than the 2.59 percent forecast by the government last month, thanks to higher external demand from the US, Europe and China, Cathay Financial said.
Hsu Chih-chiang (徐之強), an economics professor at National Central University, who co-headed the quarterly research with Cathay Financial, said exports would grow 4.43 percent next year — stronger than the 3.41 percent estimated by the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics last month.
The New Taiwan dollar is likely to weaken further against the US dollar in the next six months after the US Federal Reserve starts to taper its quantitative easing, said Hsu Shih-hsun (徐士勛), an economics professor at National Chengchi University.
A weaker currency is more favorable for exports and the economy as a whole, as evidenced by Japan’s economic reform, he said.
The NT dollar yesterday fell for an 11th straight session against the greenback, ending down NT$0.03 to close at NT$30.039.
However, the public may not fully appreciate the pickup as the ratio of overseas production keeps climbing, hitting 53.7 percent of overall output last month, Hsu Chih-chiang said.
Taiwan may see low GDP growth in the coming years given the difficulties in revamping industry and the increasing lack of competitiveness among domestic technology firms, he said.
“It will be difficult for GDP growth to reach above the 3 percent level” unless the government is ready for bold reforms, he added.
The financial sectors should be given more flexibility to diversify their product lines so they can account for a bigger chunk of GDP, which is currently at about 6 percent, compared with 9 percent in 2000, Cathay Financial chief investment officer Sophia Cheng (程淑芬) 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
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],”
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
Thousands of parents in Singapore are furious after a Cordlife Group Ltd (康盛人生集團), a major operator of cord blood banks in Asia, irreparably damaged their children’s samples through improper handling, with some now pursuing legal action. The ongoing case, one of the worst to hit the largely untested industry, has renewed concerns over companies marketing themselves to anxious parents with mostly unproven assurances. This has implications across the region, given Cordlife’s operations in Hong Kong, Macau, Indonesia, the Philippines and India. The parents paid for years to have their infants’ cord blood stored, with the understanding that the stem cells they contained