Fubon Financial Holding Co (富邦金控) yesterday said that wild swings in the value of its investment portfolio last year would not affect its dividend policy this year.
Fubon Life Insurance (富邦人壽), the company’s largest and most profitable unit, saw the value of its holdings drop from NT$31.7 billion (US$1.04 billion) at the end of the third quarter last year to a loss of NT$6.4 billion at the end of last year.
That compares with a portfolio value of NT$15.6 billion at the end of 2015.
Fubon Financial’s holdings have since recovered to about NT$4 billion at the end of last month amid a rally in local stock markets, chief financial officer Eddie Chen (陳彥松) said.
While the group’s dividend policy would not be significantly affected by the metric, the life insurance subsidiary might contribute a smaller share of profits to its parent, Chen said.
Conditions in the local equities market are improving, but the company still faces pressures from a 6 percent appreciation of the New Taiwan dollar so far this year, he added.
Following a surge in demand last year, Fubon Life has set a target of increasing its international bondholdings by US$3 billion to US$3.5 billion this year, adding that it has attained US$2.5 billion of its goal to take advantage of the early-year peak in issuance, Chen said.
Fubon Financial is aiming to raise its annual dividend income from NT$14.9 billion to NT$20 billion this year by expanding its holdings of local equities, he said.
Last year, Fubon Financial’s net income declined 23 percent to NT$48.42 billion from NT$63.6 billion in 2015, with earnings per share dropping to NT$4.73 from NT$6.21.
Fubon Life’s net earnings plunged to NT$28.69 billion last year from NT$41 billion a year earlier, affected by NT$15.7 billion in foreign-exchange losses, according to Fubon Financial’s latest financial statement.
The life insurer reported foreign exchange losses of NT$3.6 billion in 2015.
Fubon Financial’s return on assets and return on equities last year came in at 0.79 percent and 12.19 percent respectively, down from 1.12 percent and 16.4 percent a year earlier.
Total assets rose 6.1 percent annually to NT$6.35 trillion at the end of 2016, according to the statement.
Shares of Fubon Financial fell 0.75 percent to NT$52.70 in Taipei trading yesterday, underperforming the benchmark TAIEX, which declined 0.28 percent to 9,902.98 points.
Fubon shares have increased by 3.33 percent so far this year.
The domestic unit of the Chinese-owned, Dutch-headquartered chipmaker Nexperia BV will soon be able to produce semiconductors locally within China, according to two company sources. Nexperia is at the center of a global tug-of-war over critical semiconductor technology, with a Dutch court in February ordering a probe into alleged mismanagement at the company. The geopolitical tussle has disrupted supply chains, with some carmakers reportedly forced to cut production due to chip shortages. Local production would allow Nexperia’s domestic arm, Nexperia Semiconductors (China) Ltd (安世半導體中國), to bypass restrictions in place since October on the supply of silicon wafers — etched with tiny components to
Taiwan’s foreign exchange reserves fell below the US$600 billion mark at the end of last month, with the central bank reporting a total of US$596.89 billion — a decline of US$8.6 billion from February — ending a three-month streak of increases. The central bank attributed the drop to a combination of factors such as outflows by foreign institutional investors, currency fluctuations and its own market interventions. “The large-scale outflows disrupted the balance of supply and demand in the foreign exchange market, prompting the central bank to intervene repeatedly by selling US dollars to stabilize the local currency,” Department of Foreign
Taiwan is open to joining a global liquefied natural gas (LNG) program if one is created, but on the condition that countries provide delivery even in a scenario where there is a conflict with China, an energy department official said yesterday. While Taiwan’s priority is to have enough LNG at home, the nation is open to exploring potential strategic reserves in other countries such as Japan or South Korea, Energy Administration Deputy Director-General Chen Chung-hsien (陳崇憲) said. While the LNG market does not have a global reserve for emergencies like that of oil, the concept has been raised a few times —
AI-FUELED DEMAND: The company has been benefiting from the skyrocketing prices for DRAM chips amid the AI frenzy, especially its core product — DDR4 DRAM chips DRAM chipmaker Nanya Technology Corp (南亞科技) yesterday reported that its revenue for the first quarter surged 582.91 percent to NT$49.09 billion (US$1.54 billion) from NT$7.19 billion a year earlier, as the supply crunch caused chip price spikes. Last quarter’s figure is the highest on record. On a quarterly basis, revenue jumped 63.14 percent from NT$30.09 billion, the company said. In January, Nanya Technology expected global DRAM supply scarcity to continue through the first half of 2028, thanks to strong demand for artificial intelligence (AI) applications. Market researcher TrendForce Corp (集邦科技) forecast prices of standard DRAM chips would rise between 58 percent and 63
RSS