Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas Governor Nestor Espenilla yesterday called for calm after the peso fell to an almost 11-year low against the US dollar last week, saying the currency is not expected to free fall given the nation’s strong economic fundamentals.
“The peso is market-determined. It’s natural for it to show volatility as it adjusts to market conditions and all the short-term uncertainties such as increased tension in North Korea,” Espenilla said in a telephone message to reporters.
“We don’t expect it to do a free fall because our economic fundamentals now, unlike before, are solid and very strong,” he said.
The peso has lost 2.5 percent this year, making it the worst performer among 12 Asian currencies tracked by Bloomberg. It weakened to 50.98 to the greenback on Friday, the lowest since August 29, 2006.
The currency has been dropping as the nation heads to its first current account deficit in 15 years. Geopolitical concerns have also spurred a flight to assets of advanced economies.
Still, the nation enjoys strong domestic demand and is one of the fastest-growing economies in the world.
“The peso is capable of correcting itself as the market calms down and digests the relevant information,” Espenilla said.
The central bank can act “strategically” if there’s excess volatility, noting a “huge pile of fx [foreign exchange] reserves,” he said.
Espenilla, who took over as central bank chief last month, also said that the Philippines, as an emerging market economy seeking to grow, is bound to run moderate current account deficits as it catches up on investments, particularly on infrastructure.
“Lets calm down. We’re on the right track,” Espenilla said, rejecting what he termed as “fear-based hand wringing in some of the coverage.”
Taiwan Transport and Storage Corp (TTS, 台灣通運倉儲) yesterday unveiled its first electric tractor unit — manufactured by Volvo Trucks — in a ceremony in Taipei, and said the unit would soon be used to transport cement produced by Taiwan Cement Corp (TCC, 台灣水泥). Both TTS and TCC belong to TCC International Holdings Ltd (台泥國際集團). With the electric tractor unit, the Taipei-based cement firm would become the first in Taiwan to use electric vehicles to transport construction materials. TTS chairman Koo Kung-yi (辜公怡), Volvo Trucks vice president of sales and marketing Johan Selven, TCC president Roman Cheng (程耀輝) and Taikoo Motors Group
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
New apartments in Taiwan’s major cities are getting smaller, while old apartments are increasingly occupied by older people, many of whom live alone, government data showed. The phenomenon has to do with sharpening unaffordable property prices and an aging population, property brokers said. Apartments with one bedroom that are two years old or older have gained a noticeable presence in the nation’s six special municipalities as well as Hsinchu county and city in the past five years, Evertrust Rehouse Co (永慶房產集團) found, citing data from the government’s real-price transaction platform. In Taipei, apartments with one bedroom accounted for 19 percent of deals last
RECORD-BREAKING: TSMC’s net profit last quarter beat market expectations by expanding 8.9% and it was the best first-quarter profit in the chipmaker’s history Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), which counts Nvidia Corp as a key customer, yesterday said that artificial intelligence (AI) server chip revenue is set to more than double this year from last year amid rising demand. The chipmaker expects the growth momentum to continue in the next five years with an annual compound growth rate of 50 percent, TSMC chief executive officer C.C. Wei (魏哲家) told investors yesterday. By 2028, AI chips’ contribution to revenue would climb to about 20 percent from a percentage in the low teens, Wei said. “Almost all the AI innovators are working with TSMC to address the