The New Taiwan dollar on Friday fell against the US dollar, shedding NT$0.006 to close at NT$30.412, an increase of 0.2 percent from NT$30.479 a week earlier.
Turnover totaled US$1.087 billion during the trading session.
The greenback opened at NT$30.400 and moved between NT$30.322 and NT$30.415 before the close.
Elsewhere on Friday, the US dollar rallied to a three-week high, getting some safe-haven bids, as risk appetite for higher-yielding currencies waned with renewed uncertainty about the rollback of existing tariffs, a major component of a preliminary US-China trade deal.
The Japanese yen, another safe haven, rose as well.
US President Donald Trump on Friday further magnified the uncertainty, saying that he had not agreed to roll back tariffs.
His comments came a day after US and Chinese officials reportedly agreed to roll back tariffs on each other’s goods in a “phase one” trade deal if it is completed.
However, a report that seemed to contradict that news, with multiple sources saying that the rollback faces fierce internal opposition at the White House and from outside advisers.
The idea of a tariff rollback was not part of last month’s original “handshake” deal between Chinese Vice Premier Liu He (劉鶴) and Trump, the sources said.
“What really has been driving the market is this underlying uncertainty over whether or not we will get that rollback,” Natwest Markets head of G10 foreign exchange strategy Brian Daingerfield said in Stamford, Connecticut.
However, overall sentiment is likely to remain supportive for risky assets, as efforts are being made to do a trade deal, which would remove a huge risk to the global economic outlook.
“The fact that there is some discussion of moving existing tariffs leans more positive,” Daingerfield said.
White House spokeswoman Stephanie Grisham on Friday told Fox Business Network in an interview that tariffs could be lifted on Chinese goods if an agreement is reached, but she gave no further details.
In afternoon trading, the US dollar index rose 0.2 percent to 98.362 after hitting a three-week high, led by gains against the euro, which dipped 0.3 percent to US$1.1020.
As trade tensions persist, the US dollar is likely to stay strong, Capital Economics Ltd senior markets economist Jonas Goltermann said in London.
“While we don’t expect relative interest rates to boost the [US] dollar much further in the near term, we think that continued trade tensions and a slowing global economy mean that the greenback will rise a bit further in 2020, despite the fact that on a trade-weighted basis it is already near its highest level since the early 2000s,” Goltermann said.
However, the US dollar fell 0.1 percent to ¥109.17.
The Canadian dollar slid against the greenback after data showed that the Canadian job market unexpectedly stagnated last month, losing 1,800 net positions, while the unemployment rate remained at 5.5 percent.
The US dollar was last up 0.4 percent at C$1.3228.
DECOUPLING? In a sign of deeper US-China technology decoupling, Apple has held initial talks about using Baidu’s generative AI technology in its iPhones, the Wall Street Journal said China has introduced guidelines to phase out US microprocessors from Intel Corp and Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD) from government PCs and servers, the Financial Times reported yesterday. The procurement guidance also seeks to sideline Microsoft Corp’s Windows operating system and foreign-made database software in favor of domestic options, the report said. Chinese officials have begun following the guidelines, which were unveiled in December last year, the report said. They order government agencies above the township level to include criteria requiring “safe and reliable” processors and operating systems when making purchases, the newspaper said. The US has been aiming to boost domestic semiconductor
Nvidia Corp earned its US$2.2 trillion market cap by producing artificial intelligence (AI) chips that have become the lifeblood powering the new era of generative AI developers from start-ups to Microsoft Corp, OpenAI and Google parent Alphabet Inc. Almost as important to its hardware is the company’s nearly 20 years’ worth of computer code, which helps make competition with the company nearly impossible. More than 4 million global developers rely on Nvidia’s CUDA software platform to build AI and other apps. Now a coalition of tech companies that includes Qualcomm Inc, Google and Intel Corp plans to loosen Nvidia’s chokehold by going
ENERGY IMPACT: The electricity rate hike is expected to add about NT$4 billion to TSMC’s electricity bill a year and cut its annual earnings per share by about NT$0.154 Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) has left its long-term gross margin target unchanged despite the government deciding on Friday to raise electricity rates. One of the heaviest power consuming manufacturers in Taiwan, TSMC said it always respects the government’s energy policy and would continue to operate its fabs by making efforts in energy conservation. The chipmaker said it has left a long-term goal of more than 53 percent in gross margin unchanged. The Ministry of Economic Affairs concluded a power rate evaluation meeting on Friday, announcing electricity tariffs would go up by 11 percent on average to about NT$3.4518 per kilowatt-hour (kWh)
OPENING ADDRESS: The CEO is to give a speech on the future of high-performance computing and artificial intelligence at the trade show’s opening on June 3, TAITRA said Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD) chairperson and chief executive officer Lisa Su (蘇姿丰) is to deliver the opening keynote speech at Computex Taipei this year, the event’s organizer said in a statement yesterday. Su is to give a speech on the future of high-performance computing (HPC) in the artificial intelligence (AI) era to open Computex, one of the world’s largest computer and technology trade events, at 9:30am on June 3, the Taiwan External Trade Development Council (TAITRA) said. Su is to explore how AMD and the company’s strategic technology partners are pushing the limits of AI and HPC, from data centers to