Chailease Holding Co Ltd (中租控股) expects its expanded presence in Southeast Asia to sustain earnings growth this year, chairman Albert Chen (陳鳳龍) said last week.
Highlighting its focus on the region, the nation’s top leasing services provider this year began reporting on its new operations in Vietnam and Malaysia along with its more established business in Thailand.
The two markets are expected to provide stable profit contribution and the company has established a presence in five of 10 ASEAN countries, Chen told investors at an earnings conference in Taipei.
In addition, the company’s new operations in the Philippines are to begin in the next two to three months, Chen said.
The company is also studying the feasibility of expanding to Laos, Indonesia and Myanmar in the next one to two years, he added.
The company’s ASEAN operations last year saw net profit rise 7 percent annually to NT$758 million (US$24.8 million) and revenue grow 6 percent to NT$3.02 billion, the company’s latest financial statements released on Monday last week showed.
Its loan book for the region expanded 11 percent annually to NT$34.04 billion, with Chailease saying it aims for a 10 percent increase in lending there this year.
Overall, the company’s net income last year rose 6 percent to NT$7.24 billion, with total revenue rising 3 percent annually to NT$36.83 billion.
Its total loan portfolio last year rose 9 percent annually to NT$249.19 billion, primarily due to a 14 percent rise in Taiwan to NT$138.46 billion, while China saw lending slip 2 percent to NT$73.1 billion due to a weakening yuan, the company said.
While return on assets (ROA) last year declined slightly from 2.8 percent in 2015 to 2.7 percent, the firm maintained its return on equity (ROE) at 19 percent, Chailease said.
ROE and ROA are the two most frequently used benchmarks when comparing profitability among financial institutions.
As investors expect further improvement in Chailease’s asset quality to enhance its profitability, shares have rallied 30.67 percent so far this year, outranking the broader market’s 7.08 percent increase over the period, Taiwan Stock Exchange data showed.
Chailease shares closed at NT$72 in Taipei trading on Friday.
Capital Investment Management Corp (群益投顧) gave a positive outlook on Chailease’s business growth this year, as a recovery in capital demand takes hold at the firm’s main markets in Taiwan and China.
Taiwan, which contributed 62 percent to the company’s total profit last year, is projected to maintain a steady 8 to 10 percent annual expansion in loans this year as the nation’s economic growth momentum recovers, Capital said in a report on Wednesday last week.
China, representing 26 percent of Chailease’s profit last year, is expected to see loans rise by 7 to 9 percent following increasing capital demand from small and medium-sized businesses, the report said.
The Chinese market would also be helped by expectations that the yuan’s strength would be more stable this year, the report said.
Chailease’s Chinese operations would also see lower delinquency due to a more careful selection of borrowers, leading to a 5 percent reduction in general provisions beginning next quarter, Capital said.
CHIP RACE: Three years of overbroad export controls drove foreign competitors to pursue their own AI chips, and ‘cost US taxpayers billions of dollars,’ Nvidia said China has figured out the US strategy for allowing it to buy Nvidia Corp’s H200s and is rejecting the artificial intelligence (AI) chip in favor of domestically developed semiconductors, White House AI adviser David Sacks said, citing news reports. US President Donald Trump on Monday said that he would allow shipments of Nvidia’s H200 chips to China, part of an administration effort backed by Sacks to challenge Chinese tech champions such as Huawei Technologies Co (華為) by bringing US competition to their home market. On Friday, Sacks signaled that he was uncertain about whether that approach would work. “They’re rejecting our chips,” Sacks
NATIONAL SECURITY: Intel’s testing of ACM tools despite US government control ‘highlights egregious gaps in US technology protection policies,’ a former official said Chipmaker Intel Corp has tested chipmaking tools this year from a toolmaker with deep roots in China and two overseas units that were targeted by US sanctions, according to two sources with direct knowledge of the matter. Intel, which fended off calls for its CEO’s resignation from US President Donald Trump in August over his alleged ties to China, got the tools from ACM Research Inc, a Fremont, California-based producer of chipmaking equipment. Two of ACM’s units, based in Shanghai and South Korea, were among a number of firms barred last year from receiving US technology over claims they have
BARRIERS: Gudeng’s chairman said it was unlikely that the US could replicate Taiwan’s science parks in Arizona, given its strict immigration policies and cultural differences Gudeng Precision Industrial Co (家登), which supplies wafer pods to the world’s major semiconductor firms, yesterday said it is in no rush to set up production in the US due to high costs. The company supplies its customers through a warehouse in Arizona jointly operated by TSS Holdings Ltd (德鑫控股), a joint holding of Gudeng and 17 Taiwanese firms in the semiconductor supply chain, including specialty plastic compounds producer Nytex Composites Co (耐特) and automated material handling system supplier Symtek Automation Asia Co (迅得). While the company has long been exploring the feasibility of setting up production in the US to address
OPTION: Uber said it could provide higher pay for batch trips, if incentives for batching is not removed entirely, as the latter would force it to pass on the costs to consumers Uber Technologies Inc yesterday warned that proposed restrictions on batching orders and minimum wages could prompt a NT$20 delivery fee increase in Taiwan, as lower efficiency would drive up costs. Uber CEO Dara Khosrowshahi made the remarks yesterday during his visit to Taiwan. He is on a multileg trip to the region, which includes stops in South Korea and Japan. His visit coincided the release last month of the Ministry of Labor’s draft bill on the delivery sector, which aims to safeguard delivery workers’ rights and improve their welfare. The ministry set the minimum pay for local food delivery drivers at
RSS