Economists are split as to whether Taiwan’s central bank will add to its yearlong easing cycle at today’s meeting, a Bloomberg survey showed.
The monetary policy board, led by central bank Governor Perng Fai-nan (彭淮南), is expected to hold the key interest rate at 1.375 percent, according to 14 out of 26 economists surveyed between Sept. 22 and Tuesday. The other 12 forecast a reduction to 1.25 percent in what would be the fifth reduction since September last year.
Stronger-than-expected sales for Apple Inc’s new iPhone 7 are supporting electronics companies, while rising commodity prices benefit traditional industries like petrochemicals makers, said Yen Chen-hui (顏承暉), a Taipei-based strategist at Yuanta-Polaris Research Institute (元大寶華綜經院).
This quarter, there is “no need” for the central bank to help exporters by cutting the interest rate and depreciating the New Taiwan dollar, Yen said.
Export orders jumped 8.3 percent last month from a year earlier — the first expansion in 17 months — on rising demand for the components inside handheld devices as well as electrical machinery. Industrial production in the same month rose 7.74 percent, in part on electronics and also on rising oil prices.
On the other side of the split projection are those who see a more prolonged L-shaped recovery for the global economy. The effect of the iPhone might not last beyond one or two quarters, said Ma Tieying (馬鐵英), a Singapore-based economist at DBS Bank.
In the meantime, with the US holding off on raising rates, Taiwan can enact a cut without having to worry too much about capital outflows, Ma said.
The government last month revised its GDP growth estimate for this year to a 1.22 percent expansion, up from 1.06 percent.
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
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