The nation’s official manufacturing purchasing managers’ index (PMI) came in at 53.3 last month, settling above the neutral mark for the fourth straight month, as operating conditions continued to improve thanks to the approaching high-sales season for technology products, the Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research (CIER, 中華經濟研究院) said yesterday.
The data showed a marginal decline of 1.6 points from May’s 54.9, indicating that the pace of improvement is moderate, fragile and not broad-based.
“The manufacturing industry has bottomed out and is on a slow course to recovery as evidenced by the PMI figures,” CIER president Wu Chung-shu (吳中書) told a news conference.
PMI surveys aim to analyze the health of the nation’s manufacturing industry, with scores above 50 indicating expansion and values below the threshold suggesting a contraction.
All constituent indices showed positive cyclical movements and the upturn extended to all manufacturing sectors except electrical and machinery equipment, the institute said.
The sub-index on new orders and export orders registered 55.3 and 50.3 respectively last month, slowing from 58 and 53.6 respectively in May, as some sectors fared better than others.
Companies in the supply chains of global technology giants are benefiting from the preparation to introduce next-generation products in fall, Supply Management Institute in Taiwan (中華採購與供應管理協會) executive director Steve Lai (賴樹鑫) said.
US procurement executives do not foresee major disruptions for the remainder of the year, despite the UK’s decision to leave the EU, Lai said, citing a poll by the US Institute for Supply Management.
US manufacturers remain more upbeat about their business prospects in the second half compared with the first half, and Taiwanese firms voiced similar views, although the confidence level slackened over the past three months, Lai said.
More than a majority of local manufacturers expect their revenue, profit and capacity to increase in the rest of the year from current levels, according to a semi-annual survey.
The improvement extended to non-manufacturing sectors as the non-manufacturing index last month rebounded to 51.7 from May’s 47.9, but non-manufacturers are less optimistic than manufacturers, a separate report found.
The weak sentiment is more evident among hotels, restaurants and construction companies, as cooling cross-strait ties worry hospitality providers and sluggish property transactions weigh on real-estate developers, the report said.
Poland is betting on a flood of investments and technology transfers from Taiwanese companies to reengineer its US$1 trillion economy. Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said yesterday that Poland will no longer be “just an assembly hub” as it pursues further investments from the likes of Foxconn Technology Group (富士康). The firm, whose full name is Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), last month agreed to build electric vehicles (EVs) in the European Union nation and now could be a partner in a semiconductor venture, he said. The government’s aim is to boost manufacturing and the country’s high-tech chops in an era
Taiwan remained the sixth-largest net creditor nation in the world last year, despite a fall of more than 10 percent in its net international investment position (NIIP) over the year, the central bank said yesterday. The NIIP is the difference between a country’s external financial assets and its external financial liabilities. Taiwan’s external financial assets hit US$3.27 trillion at the end of last year, up US$275.75 billion or 9.2 percent from a year earlier, the central bank said in its annual NIIP report. The growth largely reflected an increase in holdings of overseas marketable securities by residents in Taiwan, as well as a
BAD FAITH LITIGATION? The two companies, owned by a California-based private equity firm, could be seeking licensing fees or a settlement payout with the suit Taiwan Intellectual Property Office (TIPO) Director-General Liao Cheng-wei (廖承威) said yesterday he suspected that two firms suing contract chipmaker Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) for patent infringement are “patent trolls.” A patent troll refers to a company that buys patents not for manufacturing products, but to sue other companies for compensation, accusing them of using its patents. Patent trolls, formally called Non-Practicing Entities or Patent Assertion Entities, were responsible for more than 50 percent of lawsuits in the US last year, costing targeted businesses tens of billions of US dollars a year, according to the US-based LegalCharity Web site. Asked whether
RESTRICTION BREACH: ASML said that it denies ‘unfounded rumors regarding non-compliance with export controls concerning China,’ and enforces controls strictly US Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick in a series of recent meetings outlined concerns to Dutch chip-equipment giant ASML Holding NV’s senior leaders that one of its top-of-the-line machines might have made its way into China, in violation of US-led export restrictions. In the meetings, Lutnick expressed concern to ASML executives over the company’s extreme ultraviolet lithography (EUV) machines, people familiar with the talks said. EUV systems are used by firms such as Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (台積電) to manufacture processors for the likes of Nvidia Corp and Apple Inc. ASML has never been allowed to ship them to China because of curbs
RSS