The New Taiwan dollar on Thursday fell against the US dollar, shedding NT$0.012 to close at NT$31.402.
However, that was a gain of 0.7 percent from a close of NT$31.612 on May 31.
Turnover totaled US$761 million during the trading session, the last of the week, as the market was closed on Friday for the Dragon Boat Festival holiday long weekend.
The greenback opened at NT$31.4, and moved between NT$31.349 and NT$31.417 before the close.
Elsewhere on Friday, the euro was headed for its best week since September last year, largely due to weakness in the US dollar.
US nonfarm payrolls data for last month showed a drop in hiring, which investors said could bolster the case for the US Federal Reserve to cut interest rates later this year.
The prospects of the Fed reacting to an escalating US-China trade row by cutting rates this week dragged the US dollar to a two-month low and helped the euro rise to more than US$1.13.
The US dollar was marginally up on Friday, but still headed for its worst week since March.
Meanwhile, the euro relinquished all of its gains from Thursday after a policy review by the European Central Bank that was less dovish than expected.
It was down 0.1 percent to US$1.1269, but still set for a weekly gain of 0.9 percent, its best weekly performance against the US dollar since late September.
“The NFP [nonfarm payrolls] series, more than most, tends to hold up until it falls off the edge of a cliff, and that cliff is getting closer,” Societe Generale SA strategist Kit Juckes said.
A slowdown in the US labor market was evident in a worse-than-expected ADP National Employment Report released on Wednesday.
Others were more sanguine about the US dollar’s prospects.
“I believe the market’s assumption that the Fed is going to cut interest rates soon is premature. For now, the Fed can afford to remain patient,” ACLS Global analyst Marshall Gittler said.
“I would expect the dollar to recover over the medium term, although it may take some time before people realize that a rate cut is not imminent,” Gittler added.
The European Central Bank on Thursday ruled out raising rates in the next year and even opened the door to buying more bonds as a global trade war and Brexit drag the eurozone economy down.
However, the market had been expecting a stronger hint of a rate cut, and consequently the euro and eurozone bond yields rose, putting more pressure on the US dollar.
Against a basket of six other major currencies, the US dollar was steady at 97.115, trading about 0.3 percent above Wednesday’s eight-week low of 96.749.
The US dollar index was on course for a 0.72 percent loss this week, its worst weekly performance since the week of March 15, when it gave up 0.73 percent.
Taiwanese firms have increased investment in the Philippines in recent years as Manila’s ties with Washington deepen and global supply chains continue to shift away from China, an expert at the Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research (CIER, 中華經濟研究院) said yesterday. The Philippines had not been among Taiwanese investors’ top choices in Southeast Asia, CIER Taiwan ASEAN Studies Center director Kristy Hsu (徐遵慈) said at a seminar in Taipei. However, Taiwan’s investment in the country has grown significantly since the COVID-19 pandemic, reaching US $257 million last year, a high in recent years, she said. Although Taiwan’s total investment in the Philippines still lags
Intel Corp regards Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) as a longstanding partner, as the US chipmaker would continue outsourcing production of advanced chips to TSMC, Intel chief executive officer Lip-Bu Tan (陳立武) said yesterday. “I don’t look at people as competitors. I look at the collaboration... Nvidia is also, you know, a good friend,” Tan told a news conference following his keynote speech at the Computex trade show in Taipei. “It’s a very trusted partnership for us... We are a big, top customer for them, and we’re going to continue doing that,” he said, referring to TSMC, the world’s largest foundry
Artificial intelligence (AI) agents would supplant smartphones as the center of people’s digital lives, fundamentally reshaping personal devices and driving a major computing upgrade cycle, Qualcomm Inc CEO Cristiano Amon said yesterday. In his keynote speech for this year’s Computex trade show in Taipei, Amon said that the rise of "agentic AI" — AI systems capable of reasoning, planning and carrying out tasks autonomously — would transform how people interact with technology across phones, PCs, vehicles and wearable devices. Describing the technology as the next major evolution in computing, Amon said that "2026 is the year of agents.” For decades, smartphones have sat
The average pay to employees by ASE Technology Holding Co (日月光投控) was the highest among the companies listed on the local main board last year, while contract chipmaker Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) ranked seventh, the Taiwan Stock Exchange (TWSE) said on Monday. Data compiled by the exchange showed ASE Technology, the world’s largest chip packaging and testing services provider, paid its employees an average of NT$6.28 million (US$199,746) last year, up 40 percent from a year earlier. TSMC, the world’s largest contract chipmaker and the most profitable company in Taiwan, paid its employees NT$4.09 million on average, up