FINANCIAL SERVICES
Fubon top earner again
Fubon Financial Holding Co (富邦金控) on Saturday reported a record high net income of NT$63.63 billion (US$1.89 billion) for last year, making it the most profitable financial services provider in Taiwan for the seventh straight year. Net profit rose 5.6 percent from 2014, with earnings per share of NT$6.22. Fubon Financial attributed the strong profitability to growth in its life insurance unit. Fubon Life Insurance Co (富邦人壽) reported earnings expanded 16.8 percent to NT$41.31 billion last year, while Taipei Fubon Commercial Bank’s (台北富邦銀行) net income reached NT$17.58 billion, compared with NT$18 billion in 2014.
MANUFACTURING
Inventory-to-sales ratio up
The inventory-to-sales ratio for the manufacturing sector increased to 73.49 percent in November last year from 69.35 percent the previous month, underlining the heightened uncertainty over the nation’s economy, Ministry of Economic Affairs data showed last week. The ministry said the increase was the result of a decline in manufacturers’ inventories being smaller than the fall in their sales, as manufacturing revenue dropped by the largest contraction in two years at 4.55 percent in the month.
SERVICES
ISI rose in November
The index of service industry (ISI) stood at 94 points in November last year, up from 92 points the previous month, thanks partly to a NT$4 billion short-term stimulus package the government launched in October to raise consumption, the Commerce Development Research Institute (商業發展研究院) said last week. The central bank’s two interest rate cuts in the second half of last year also contributed to the improvement, it 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],”
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
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