Cathay United Bank (國泰世華銀行) yesterday reported NT$6.2 billion (US$200.4 million) in overseas profits for the first nine months of this year, a 23 percent decline from a year earlier, as the firm has cut overseas investment due to strong volatility.
Cathay Financial Holding Co (國泰金控) spokesman Daniel Teng (鄧崇儀) presented the figures at an investors’ conference in Taipei.
The bank last year reported NT$10 billion in overseas profit, a 17 percent increase from 2016 and the highest in five years, Teng said, adding that the bank last year increased investment, especially in Singapore.
“This year, we have been puzzled by the change and trend in overseas markets, and decided to take a break, reducing overseas investment,” Teng said, adding that overseas profit accounted for 29.6 percent of the bank’s total profit as of September, down from 43.1 percent a year earlier.
The nation’s largest financial services provider by assets reported NT$54.6 billion in net profit as of September, a 13 percent growth from a year earlier, but saw net profit last month plummet 82 percent year-on-year from NT$3.38 billion to NT$590 million.
The conglomerate had to raise its hedging costs due to global market volatility last month and is likely to continue increasing them, as it expects to see greater volatility next year due to an escalating US-China trade war, Cathay Financial president Lee Chang-ken (李長庚) said.
The trade war, which has brought greater risks and uncertainty to global markets, is expected to end in two years, as US President Donald Trump wants to win the 2020 US presidential election, but cannot soften sanctions on China in the short term, Lee said.
Cathay Life Insurance Co (國泰人壽) reported NT$36.62 billion in net profit for the first nine months, a 10.5 percent year-on-year increase.
The insurer’s NT$3.32 trillion investment in foreign bonds accounted for 57.8 percent of total investment, generating a 4.7 percent return, company data showed.
Domestic and foreign shares made up 8.1 percent and 7.1 percent of total investment, amounting to NT$464 billion and NT$407 billion and generating 12.1 percent and 10.8 percent returns respectively, the highest return among all of its targets, the firm said.
The insurer said it expects to see the global economy continue to grow in the next six months and plans to increase stock purchases in Taiwan, the US and China, but foreign bonds would remain its major target.
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],”
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
Thousands of parents in Singapore are furious after a Cordlife Group Ltd (康盛人生集團), a major operator of cord blood banks in Asia, irreparably damaged their children’s samples through improper handling, with some now pursuing legal action. The ongoing case, one of the worst to hit the largely untested industry, has renewed concerns over companies marketing themselves to anxious parents with mostly unproven assurances. This has implications across the region, given Cordlife’s operations in Hong Kong, Macau, Indonesia, the Philippines and India. The parents paid for years to have their infants’ cord blood stored, with the understanding that the stem cells they contained