AUTOMOBILES
Car sales rise 8.3 percent
The nation’s new passenger car sales rose 8.3 percent last month from a year earlier to 48,000 units, getting off to a strong start this year after total sales of new cars last year rose 12 percent to 423,829 units from 2013. According to statistics provided by the Ministry of Transportation and Communications on Monday, Hotai Motor Co (和泰汽車), which sells Toyota and Lexus vehicles in Taiwan, continued to lead the market last month, distributing 15,358 cars, followed by Yulon Nissan Motor Co (裕隆日產), which distributes Nissan and Infiniti cars.
FUTURES
TAIFEX to ease trading limits
The Taiwan Futures Exchange (TAIFEX, 期交所) yesterday said that futures trading would soon follow the spot market in allowing larger daily upward and downward fluctuations. The announcement followed the Financial Supervisory Commission’s decision on Tuesday to widen daily share price fluctuations to a maximum of 10 percent from the current 7 percent, starting on Aug. 3. The commission expects the new measure to boost daily turnover by about 10 percent. TAIFEX president Chiu Wen-chang (邱文昌) said the planned changes to the daily trading limits in both the spot and futures market would boost the efficiency of Taiwan’s equity markets and strengthen their liquidity.
TRADE
TAITRA, Buynow team up
The Taiwan External Trade Development Council (TAITRA, 外貿協會) yesterday said it would work with China-based retail chain Buynow (百腦匯) to promote Taiwanese products in China. TAITRA, the nation’s main trade promotion body, said it plans to open two special pavilions in two large outlets of the Buynow chain — one in Chengdu on May 1 and another in Guangzhou on Aug. 1. The two outlets will boost the number of TAITRA’s product pavilions in China to six this year. Currently, the council operates three similar pavilions in Senao’s (神腦) retail chain and one in the Dennis Department Store (丹尼斯百貨).
BANKING
Cathay Bank picks Line Pay
Cathay United Bank (國泰世華銀行) on Tuesday teamed up with Japan’s Line Corp to introduce new features of a mobile payment service in Taiwan. Line Pay, which is expected to be available in the second quarter, will allow Line users to create virtual bank accounts with Cathay United Bank via mobile phones and transfer money directly to friends within the Line app. Users can also deposit up to NT$10,000 (US$316) on their Line accounts through e-mail verification, or deposit up to NT$100,000 if their Line accounts are integrated with their virtual bank accounts certified by Cathy United Bank.
SEMICONDUCTORS
MediaTek outlook positive
Handset chip designer MediaTek Inc (聯發科) is expected to perform better than expected this quarter, Barclays Capital Securities Corp said in a client note yesterday, citing a positive guidance issued by semiconductor component distributor WPG Holdings Co (大聯大) on Tuesday. Barclays said WPG is the fourth company in Mediatek’s supply chain that has seen unusually strong seasonal demand for 4G smartphones this quarter, following similar optimistic forecasts by Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (台積電), United Microelectronics Corp (聯電) and Siliconware Precision Industries Co (矽品精密). Barclays now expects MediaTek’s sales for this quarter to decline by a smaller 5 to 10 percent from last quarter’s NT$55.45 billion.
DECOUPLING? In a sign of deeper US-China technology decoupling, Apple has held initial talks about using Baidu’s generative AI technology in its iPhones, the Wall Street Journal said China has introduced guidelines to phase out US microprocessors from Intel Corp and Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD) from government PCs and servers, the Financial Times reported yesterday. The procurement guidance also seeks to sideline Microsoft Corp’s Windows operating system and foreign-made database software in favor of domestic options, the report said. Chinese officials have begun following the guidelines, which were unveiled in December last year, the report said. They order government agencies above the township level to include criteria requiring “safe and reliable” processors and operating systems when making purchases, the newspaper said. The US has been aiming to boost domestic semiconductor
Nvidia Corp earned its US$2.2 trillion market cap by producing artificial intelligence (AI) chips that have become the lifeblood powering the new era of generative AI developers from start-ups to Microsoft Corp, OpenAI and Google parent Alphabet Inc. Almost as important to its hardware is the company’s nearly 20 years’ worth of computer code, which helps make competition with the company nearly impossible. More than 4 million global developers rely on Nvidia’s CUDA software platform to build AI and other apps. Now a coalition of tech companies that includes Qualcomm Inc, Google and Intel Corp plans to loosen Nvidia’s chokehold by going
OPENING ADDRESS: The CEO is to give a speech on the future of high-performance computing and artificial intelligence at the trade show’s opening on June 3, TAITRA said Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD) chairperson and chief executive officer Lisa Su (蘇姿丰) is to deliver the opening keynote speech at Computex Taipei this year, the event’s organizer said in a statement yesterday. Su is to give a speech on the future of high-performance computing (HPC) in the artificial intelligence (AI) era to open Computex, one of the world’s largest computer and technology trade events, at 9:30am on June 3, the Taiwan External Trade Development Council (TAITRA) said. Su is to explore how AMD and the company’s strategic technology partners are pushing the limits of AI and HPC, from data centers to
ENERGY IMPACT: The electricity rate hike is expected to add about NT$4 billion to TSMC’s electricity bill a year and cut its annual earnings per share by about NT$0.154 Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) has left its long-term gross margin target unchanged despite the government deciding on Friday to raise electricity rates. One of the heaviest power consuming manufacturers in Taiwan, TSMC said it always respects the government’s energy policy and would continue to operate its fabs by making efforts in energy conservation. The chipmaker said it has left a long-term goal of more than 53 percent in gross margin unchanged. The Ministry of Economic Affairs concluded a power rate evaluation meeting on Friday, announcing electricity tariffs would go up by 11 percent on average to about NT$3.4518 per kilowatt-hour (kWh)