Stocks in Taipei yesterday closed higher, prompted by rises in electronic, Apple Inc-linked firm and small and medium-sized enterprise shares, with the TAIEX climbing to 8,745.36 points, its highest level since late July, dealers said.
However, the rise was accompanied by weak trading momentum due to a lack of encouraging news to stimulate trade, despite last week’s exciting surges on the US and European stock markets triggered by earnings reports from some US high-tech companies, proposals for measures to boost the eurozone’s economy and China’s decision to further lower interest rates, the dealers said.
The TAIEX closed up 71.55 points, or 0.82 percent, at 8,745.36, after moving between 8,757.14 and 8,706.81. Turnover totaled NT$84.41 billion (US$2.58 billion) during the session.
With Apple Inc scheduled to publish its latest financial statement today, trading in Apple connected stocks in Taipei was strong, with shares of smartphone camera lens maker Largan Precision Co (大立光) rising NT$115, or 4.7 percent, to NT$2,555.
Printed circuit board supplier Flexium Interconnect Inc (台郡) gained 7 percent to close at NT$99.5, while Parade Technologies Ltd (譜瑞), a fabless semiconductor company specializing in high-speed video interfacing and processing products, rose 7.34 percent to NT$278.
Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海), an assembler of iPhones and iPads for Apple, gained 1.49 percent to end at NT$88.7.
Mega International Investment Services Corp (兆豐國際投顧) analyst Alex Huang (黃國偉) said that the rises in Taiwanese shares were relatively “calm” compared with last week’s jump in new highs for US share prices.
This is because the links between profitable US enterprises and Taiwanese shares are low, Huang 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],”
TRANSFORMATION: Taiwan is now home to the largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, thanks to the nation’s economic policies President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday attended an event marking the opening of Google’s second hardware research and development (R&D) office in Taiwan, which was held at New Taipei City’s Banciao District (板橋). This signals Taiwan’s transformation into the world’s largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, validating the nation’s economic policy in the past eight years, she said. The “five plus two” innovative industries policy, “six core strategic industries” initiative and infrastructure projects have grown the national industry and established resilient supply chains that withstood the COVID-19 pandemic, Tsai said. Taiwan has improved investment conditions of the domestic economy
MAJOR BENEFICIARY: The company benefits from TSMC’s advanced packaging scarcity, given robust demand for Nvidia AI chips, analysts said ASE Technology Holding Co (ASE, 日月光投控), the world’s biggest chip packaging and testing service provider, yesterday said it is raising its equipment capital expenditure budget by 10 percent this year to expand leading-edge and advanced packing and testing capacity amid strong artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing chip demand. This is on top of the 40 to 50 percent annual increase in its capital spending budget to more than the US$1.7 billion to announced in February. About half of the equipment capital expenditure would be spent on leading-edge and advanced packaging and testing technology, the company said. ASE is considered by analysts