EQUITIES
TAIEX rallies to day’s high
Local shares yesterday staged a conspicuous rebound to finish at the session’s high, led by electronics and financial shares. The TAIEX closed up 182.63 points, or 1.71 percent, at 10,836.91, recovering the five-day moving average of 10,744 and the yearly moving average of 10,716, on turnover of NT$139.691 billion (US$4.58 billion). Although fears of a trade war between the US and China have not fully dispersed, analysts said local shares rallied in reflection of the lowered tension as long as the US refrains from triggering new unease. The stock market is expected to stay stable and gradually climb due to relatively thin trade at a time when foreign institutional investors have started to walk away from the trading floor with the start of the summer break.
BANKING
TBB forecasts improvement
State-run Taiwan Business Bank (TBB, 台灣企銀) expects performance to improve this quarter and continue growing in the next two quarters, chairman James Shih (施建安) told an annual general meeting yesterday, adding that he expects the company’s stock price to soon rise above the face value of NT$10 per share with book value of NT$13.28 per share. TBB shares yesterday closed at NT$9.41 in Taipei trading. The company reported pretax profit of NT$0.49 per share in the first five months of this year. Last year, net profit totaled NT$5.04 billion, or NT$0.82 per share.
BANKING
OBU assets total US$203bn
The 60 offshore banking units (OBUs) of financial institutions operating in Taiwan had assets totaling US$203.156 billion as of the end of last month, down US$764 million, or 0.4 percent, from April, the central bank said in a statement yesterday. The OBUs of 37 local banks held US$180.86 billion in assets, while foreign banks’ 23 OBUs held US$22.296 billion, it said. At the end of last month, the primary uses of all OBUs’ funds were discounts and loans, amounting to US$82.142 billion, or 40.4 percent of total assets, it added.
SERVICES
Synnex to acquire Convergys
New York Stock Exchange-listed Synnex Corp, in which Taiwan’s Synnex Technology International Corp (聯強國際) has an interest, yesterday announced that it would acquire Convergys Corp and then integrate it with Concentrix, a wholly owned subsidiary and top global provider of customer relationship management and business process outsourcing services. The Fremont, California-based firm said it has reached a definitive agreement with Convergys, but did not disclose financial terms. The transaction is expected to close by the end of this calendar year, subject to the approval of shareholders of both companies, regulatory requirements and customary closing conditions, the company said in a statement.
ELECTRONICS
CCIS warns of overreliance
Six of Taiwan’s top 10 corporations by net revenue are electronics companies that are part of Apple Inc’s supply chain, resulting in an overreliance on the US company, a China Credit Information Service (CCIS, 中華徵信所) report said on Thursday. Total revenue for the six enterprises, including Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), increased from NT$34.7542 trillion in 2016 to a record high of NT$36.1433 trillion last year, the report said.
Intel Corp chief executive officer Lip-Bu Tan (陳立武) is expected to meet with Taiwanese suppliers next month in conjunction with the opening of the Computex Taipei trade show, supply chain sources said on Monday. The visit, the first for Tan to Taiwan since assuming his new post last month, would be aimed at enhancing Intel’s ties with suppliers in Taiwan as he attempts to help turn around the struggling US chipmaker, the sources said. Tan is to hold a banquet to celebrate Intel’s 40-year presence in Taiwan before Computex opens on May 20 and invite dozens of Taiwanese suppliers to exchange views
Application-specific integrated circuit designer Faraday Technology Corp (智原) yesterday said that although revenue this quarter would decline 30 percent from last quarter, it retained its full-year forecast of revenue growth of 100 percent. The company attributed the quarterly drop to a slowdown in customers’ production of chips using Faraday’s advanced packaging technology. The company is still confident about its revenue growth this year, given its strong “design-win” — or the projects it won to help customers design their chips, Faraday president Steve Wang (王國雍) told an online earnings conference. “The design-win this year is better than we expected. We believe we will win
Chizuko Kimura has become the first female sushi chef in the world to win a Michelin star, fulfilling a promise she made to her dying husband to continue his legacy. The 54-year-old Japanese chef regained the Michelin star her late husband, Shunei Kimura, won three years ago for their Sushi Shunei restaurant in Paris. For Shunei Kimura, the star was a dream come true. However, the joy was short-lived. He died from cancer just three months later in June 2022. He was 65. The following year, the restaurant in the heart of Montmartre lost its star rating. Chizuko Kimura insisted that the new star is still down
While China’s leaders use their economic and political might to fight US President Donald Trump’s trade war “to the end,” its army of social media soldiers are embarking on a more humorous campaign online. Trump’s tariff blitz has seen Washington and Beijing impose eye-watering duties on imports from the other, fanning a standoff between the economic superpowers that has sparked global recession fears and sent markets into a tailspin. Trump says his policy is a response to years of being “ripped off” by other countries and aims to bring manufacturing to the US, forcing companies to employ US workers. However, China’s online warriors
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