EQUITIES
Margin maintenance cut
The Financial Supervisory Commission yesterday announced that the minimum margin maintenance ratio would be cut to 90 percent from 120 percent, reversing an adjustment implemented on Aug. 13. The change is aimed at restoring market mechanisms to the local bourse as global markets had began stabilizing, the commission said. The move came after the commission on Sept. 21 lifted a ban on short selling that took effect on Aug. 24. Separately, the commission announced that insurance regulators would meet their Chinese counterparts for the third time on Thursday next week in Nantou County to further collaborative ties in regulatory efforts.
REAL ESTATE
Shinkong auction fails
The auction of the Shinkong Manhattan World Trade Building in Taipei’s Xinyi District (信義) yesterday fell through after it failed to draw any tender offers, bidding organizer Jones Lang LaSalle Taiwan (JLL, 仲量聯行) said by telephone. JLL Taiwan managing director Tony Chao (趙正義) attributed the failed bid to weak sentiment and political uncertainty. The office building near Taipei 101 had an asking price of NT$9 billion (US$277.29 million) and belongs to Shin Kong Life Insurance Co (新光人壽).
BANKING
Yuan deposits decline
Yuan deposits at local banks fell 2.26 percent to 322.33 billion yuan (US$51.29 billion) last month from August, as investors turned cautious about the currency, the central bank said yesterday. The third consecutive month of decline came as China pushes for the yuan’s inclusion in the IMF’s reserve currency basket, making it more receptive to its volatility, the central bank said. Yuan deposits at Taiwan’s domestic banking units totaled 273.49 billion yuan, while offshore banking units had 47.68 billion yuan, down 1.3 percent and 4.23 percent respectively from August levels. Some pundits have voiced concern that the reserve currency status may deal a blow to offshore yuan markets.
TRADE
Cross-strait talks in Taipei
The next round of negotiations on a cross-strait trade in goods agreement is to take place in Taipei next month, Minister of Economic Affairs John Deng (鄧振中) said yesterday. “The Ministry of Economic Affairs’ goal is to complete negotiations of the pact before the end of this year,” he told a media briefing. Deng said the agreement would play an important role in Taiwan’s bid to join the next round of negotiations of the US-led Trans-Pacific Partnership. “If we inked the [trade in goods] pact, Taiwan would have a better trade environment to join TPP,” he said. Bureau of Foreign Trade Director-General Yang Jen-ni (楊珍妮) will lead Taiwan’s team in the next round of trade negotiations.
SOLAR
Giga Solar sees 30% growth
Giga Solar Materials Corp (碩禾), a photovoltaic conductive paste maker, expects revenue to increase by up to 30 percent next year from this year, as the solar power market gains steam in China and the US, chairman Jimmy Chen (陳繼明) said yesterday, adding that order visibility has extended into the third quarter of next year. Revenue for this year is expected to grow by more than 50 percent from last year, he said. The company’s cumulative revenue expanded 62.9 percent year-on-year to NT$10.87 billion in the first three quarters of the year.
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],”