Super-rich Taiwanese expect to grow their wealth from their investments this year, even though the domestic political and economic conditions are increasingly unfavorable for wealth creation or accumulation, global real-estate consultancy Knight Frank said in a report yesterday.
Seventy-five percent of super-rich Taiwanese voiced confidence that they would gain returns from their investments, up from 50 percent last year, Knight Frank Taiwan researcher Andy Huang (黃舒衛) said.
“Low valuations for most investment tools foster profit expectations,” Huang told a media briefing.
Photo: Hsu Yi-ping, Taipei Times
The consultancy defines “super rich” as people who have a net worth of at least US$30 million. There are 1,519 Taiwanese who meet the threshold, an increase of 4 percent from last year, Huang said.
While positive about wealth creation, 83 percent of the respondents portrayed the domestic political and economic conditions as difficult for wealth creation or accumulation, Huang said.
An escalating US-China trade dispute has cast a shadow over the global economic scene, while next year’s presidential election is adding uncertainty about policy direction, he said.
As a result, bonds were the favored investment tool, accounting for 30 percent of portfolios, followed by cash at 22 percent and real estate at 20 percent, the consultancy said.
Super-rich Taiwanese on average own 5.4 properties, the second-highest in the world, behind only Saudi Arabians with 6.4 units, the report said.
Only 16 percent plan to buy real estate for self-occupancy in Taiwan, the lowest level in Asia and down from 22 percent from last year, Huang said.
That suggests 250 luxury home transactions this year, higher than an average of 220 units over the past few years, he said.
The finding might lend support to luxury home prices that have fallen 23.8 percent from their peak in 2013, he added.
The report said that only 15 percent expressed an interest in raising their real-estate holdings in overseas markets, down from 38 percent last year.
The US tops the list of real-estate investment destinations among super-rich Taiwanese at 36 percent, while Australia and China tied for second place at 27 percent, it said.
Eighty-two percent of the children of super-rich Taiwanese receive their college education abroad, far higher than the global average of 48 percent, Huang said.
A quarter of super-rich Taiwanese have dual citizenship and additional 27 percent intend to apply for it, the report said.
Another 20 percent are looking for permanent residency in foreign nations, it said.
The US ranks the most favored destination at 45 percent, while Singapore and Australia are neck-and-neck in second place, it said.
CHIP RACE: Three years of overbroad export controls drove foreign competitors to pursue their own AI chips, and ‘cost US taxpayers billions of dollars,’ Nvidia said China has figured out the US strategy for allowing it to buy Nvidia Corp’s H200s and is rejecting the artificial intelligence (AI) chip in favor of domestically developed semiconductors, White House AI adviser David Sacks said, citing news reports. US President Donald Trump on Monday said that he would allow shipments of Nvidia’s H200 chips to China, part of an administration effort backed by Sacks to challenge Chinese tech champions such as Huawei Technologies Co (華為) by bringing US competition to their home market. On Friday, Sacks signaled that he was uncertain about whether that approach would work. “They’re rejecting our chips,” Sacks
Taiwan’s long-term economic competitiveness will hinge not only on national champions like Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC, 台積電) but also on the widespread adoption of artificial intelligence (AI) and other emerging technologies, a US-based scholar has said. At a lecture in Taipei on Tuesday, Jeffrey Ding, assistant professor of political science at the George Washington University and author of "Technology and the Rise of Great Powers," argued that historical experience shows that general-purpose technologies (GPTs) — such as electricity, computers and now AI — shape long-term economic advantages through their diffusion across the broader economy. "What really matters is not who pioneers
BUBBLE? Only a handful of companies are seeing rapid revenue growth and higher valuations, and it is not enough to call the AI trend a transformation, an analyst said Artificial intelligence (AI) is entering a more challenging phase next year as companies move beyond experimentation and begin demanding clear financial returns from a technology that has delivered big gains to only a small group of early adopters, PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) Taiwan said yesterday. Most organizations have been able to justify AI investments through cost recovery or modest efficiency gains, but few have achieved meaningful revenue growth or long-term competitive advantage, the consultancy said in its 2026 AI Business Predictions report. This growing performance gap is forcing executives to reconsider how AI is deployed across their organizations, it said. “Many companies
TAIWAN VALUE CHAIN: Foxtron is to fully own Luxgen following the transaction and it plans to launch a new electric model, the Foxtron Bria, in Taiwan next year Yulon Motor Co (裕隆汽車) yesterday said that its board of directors approved the disposal of its electric vehicle (EV) unit, Luxgen Motor Co (納智捷汽車), to Foxtron Vehicle Technologies Co (鴻華先進) for NT$787.6 million (US$24.98 million). Foxtron, a half-half joint venture between Yulon affiliate Hua-Chuang Automobile Information Technical Center Co (華創車電) and Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), expects to wrap up the deal in the first quarter of next year. Foxtron would fully own Luxgen following the transaction, including five car distributing companies, outlets and all employees. The deal is subject to the approval of the Fair Trade Commission, Foxtron said. “Foxtron will be
RSS