Companies listed on the Taiwan Stock Exchange (TWSE), excluding financial holding firms, on Wednesday reported an overall average increase in pretax profit of 15.03 percent for the first three quarters of this year due to better results in the semiconductor, optoelectronics and plastics sectors.
The 821 companies’ pretax profit totaled a combined NT$1.52 trillion (US$50.5 billion) from January to September, up NT$199.2 billion from the same period last year, TWSE said in a statement.
Over the same period, cumulative revenue of the companies rose 5.16 percent year-on-year to NT$1.97 trillion, it said.
Financially troubled Tai-I Electric Wire & Cable Co Ltd (台一國際) and Pihsiang Machinery Manufacturing Co Ltd (必翔實業) were the only companies failing to meet the deadline for reporting third-quarter financials to the TWSE, as of Tuesday last week.
Trading of Tai-I Electric’s and Pihsiang Machinery’s shares have been suspended since Friday last week, TWSE said.
Tai-I is to be delisted from the main bourse tomorrow, as it shows no signs of solving its financial difficulties soon, TWSE said.
Meanwhile, 739 companies listed on the Taipei Exchange (TPEX) saw an overall average increase in pretax profit of 17.72 percent in the first three quarters from a year earlier to NT$108.9 billion, the over-the-counter exchange said in a separate statement on Wednesday.
The increase in pretax profit was mainly driven by growth in the semiconductor, electronic components and computer peripheral devices sectors, TPEX said.
Total revenue in the first nine months also expanded 5.7 percent year-on-year to NT$1.51 trillion, the exchange said.
Taipei Exchange said 511 companies, or 69.14 percent of the 739, were profitable in the third quarter of the year, with 17 companies seeing their earnings per share (EPS) exceed NT$10 in the quarter.
Four companies — HH Leasing & Financial Corp (全銓), St Shine Optical Co Ltd (精華光學), Phison Electronics Corp (群聯電子) and Chunghwa Precision Test Technology Co (中華精測) — made an EPS of more than NT$20 last quarter, the exchange said.
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