MONEY SUPPLY
Money supply still growing
The nation’s money supply continued to increase year-on-year last month, with the broader monetary gauge M2 growing faster than the narrower M1B for a fifth month running, the central bank said yesterday. M1B, referring to cash and cash equivalents, gained 6.18 percent last month from a year earlier, slower than M2’s 6.81 percent increase, the central bank said. M2 includes savings deposits, time savings deposits, foreign currency deposits, mutual funds and M1B. The central bank attributed the faster increase in M2 to inflows of foreign funds that often move worldwide in the pursuit of higher returns.
TECHNOLOGY
Hiwin expects a pickup
Hiwin Technologies Corp (上銀科技), one of the nation’s major machine tool makers, yesterday said it expects its business performance to improve in the second half of the year on the back of increasing orders for key components for industrial automation. The company also expects gear-cutting tools maker Luren Precision Co (陸聯精密) to become profitable next year, Hiwin chairman Eric Chuo (卓永財) told shareholders. Hiwin bought a 41.93 percent stake in Luren for more than NT$100 million (US$3.22 million) in March. The company’s shareholders approved a proposal to distribute a cash dividend of NT$3.2 per share and a stock dividend of 3 percent per share based on last year’s net income of NT$2.26 billion, or NT$9.2 per share. That translates into a payout ratio of 34.78 percent and represents a cash yield of 1.52 percent, based on Hiwin’s closing price of NT$210.50 in Taipei trading yesterday.
TELECOMS
Asia Pacific expanding
Asia Pacific Telecom Co’s (亞太電信) 4G network coverage should reach 95 percent of the population by August or September, a company executive said yesterday, amid controversy over the company’s practice of offering 4G roaming services using Taiwan Mobile Telecom Co’s (台灣大哥大) network. The National Communications Commission on Tuesday signaled that it was illegal for the company to provide roaming services in the nation using Taiwan Mobile’s network. Company chairman Lu Fang-ming (呂芳銘) said the company has 295,000 4G subscribers. Asia Pacific is a telecommunications arm of Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密). The company lost NT$8.41 billion last year, reversing a net profit of NT$1.84 billion in 2013.
EQUITIES
Large caps lead advance
The TAIEX rose 0.84 percent yesterday, as large-cap stocks staged an across-the-board technical rebound, dealers said. Market sentiment improved to some extent after foreign institutional investors raised their long position contracts in the futures market in the previous session, they said. Shares of smartphone camera lens supplier Largan Precision Co (大立光) closed at a new high, amid optimism over the company’s earnings in the second half of this year, when Apple Inc’s orders are expected to stream in for production of the next generation iPhone, dealers said. The TAIEX closed 79.03 points higher at 9,476.34 on turnover of NT$101.29 billion. Among the large-cap gainers were Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (台積電), the most heavily weighted stock on the local market, which rose 1.03 percent to close at NT$146.50, while Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) advanced 1.43 percent to end at NT$99.
BUSINESS UPDATE: The iPhone assembler said operations outlook is expected to show quarter-on-quarter and year-on-year growth for the second quarter Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) yesterday reported strong growth in sales last month, potentially raising expectations for iPhone sales while artificial intelligence (AI)-related business booms. The company, which assembles the majority of Apple Inc’s smartphones, reported a 19.03 percent rise in monthly sales to NT$510.9 billion (US$15.78 billion), from NT$429.22 billion in the same period last year. On a monthly basis, sales rose 14.16 percent, it said. The company in a statement said that last month’s revenue was a record-breaking April performance. Hon Hai, known also as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團), assembles most iPhones, but the company is diversifying its business to
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE: The chipmaker last month raised its capital spending by 28 percent for this year to NT$32 billion from a previous estimate of NT$25 billion Contract chipmaker Powerchip Semiconductor Manufacturing Corp (力積電子) yesterday launched a new 12-inch fab, tapping into advanced chip-on-wafer-on-substrate (CoWoS) packaging technology to support rising demand for artificial intelligence (AI) devices. Powerchip is to offer interposers, one of three parts in CoWoS packaging technology, with shipments scheduled for the second half of this year, Powerchip chairman Frank Huang (黃崇仁) told reporters on the sidelines of a fab inauguration ceremony in the Tongluo Science Park (銅鑼科學園區) in Miaoli County yesterday. “We are working with customers to supply CoWoS-related business, utilizing part of this new fab’s capacity,” Huang said, adding that Powerchip intended to bridge
Microsoft Corp yesterday said that it would create Thailand’s first data center region to boost cloud and artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure, promising AI training to more than 100,000 people to develop tech. Bangkok is a key economic player in Southeast Asia, but it has lagged behind Indonesia and Singapore when it comes to the tech industry. Thailand has an “incredible opportunity to build a digital-first, AI-powered future,” Microsoft chairman and chief executive officer Satya Nadella said at an event in Bangkok. Data center regions are physical locations that store computing infrastructure, allowing secure and reliable access to cloud platforms. The global embrace of AI
Qualcomm Inc, the world’s biggest seller of smartphone processors, gave an upbeat forecast for sales and profit in the current period, suggesting demand for handsets is increasing after a two-year slump. Revenue in the three months ended in June will be US$8.8 billion to US$9.6 billion, the company said in a statement Wednesday. Excluding certain items, earnings will be US$2.15 to US$2.35 a share. Analysts had projected sales of US$9.08 billion and earnings of US$2.16 a share. The outlook signals that the smartphone market has begun to bounce back, tracking with Qualcomm’s forecast that demand would gradually recover this year. The San