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Cabinet task force works on revitalizing measures

A Cabinet-level task force created to deal with economic problems held its first meeting late last night to draw up concrete measures to revitalize the local stock market after Friday’s nosedive to a five-month low.

The meeting, convened by Vice Premier Paul Chiu (邱正雄), came in response to criticism that the government was not doing enough to come up with effective measures, despite meetings held by the Executive Yuan over the last three days to discuss the decline in the TAIEX.

At the Cabinet’s weekly meeting on Thursday, five measures to enhance cross-strait securities exchanges to attract overseas capital were proposed.

On Friday at noon, Premier Liu Chao-shiuan (劉兆玄) called an emergency meeting, putting Chiu in charge of the task force and Minister Without Portfolio Tsai Hsun-hsiung (蔡勳雄) in charge of a second team to help the nation’s poor and those at risk of falling into poverty.

Late Friday night, Chiu named 10 general steps to boost the economy and the stock market, adding that concrete measures would be framed by the two task forces over the weekend.

Five of the 10 proposals concerned the stock market. The Cabinet said it would increase investment by four government-run funds in leading stocks, talk to foreign investors about buying shares, encourage companies to buy back shares to boost their share prices, monitor the global stock market and “respond” to fluctuations, and seek to bring back overseas Taiwanese capital.

The other five steps were offering businesses loans to increase energy efficiency at their facilities, promoting private investment, encouraging private consumption, providing incentives for energy conservation and loosening economic and financial regulations.

Chiu spoke yesterday morning with officials from the Council for Economic Planning and Development and the Financial Supervisory Commission in preparation for his meeting with foreign investors at noon and the task force meeting.

When approached for comment after meeting foreign investors at the Securities & Futures Information Center, Chiu said only that “foreign investors sold shares in the stock market, but they haven’t remitted their capital out of the country.”

President Ma Ying-jeou (馬英九), who has kept quiet on the stock market this week, yesterday asked the Cabinet to come up with solutions to inflation and the stock market slump.

Presidential Office Spokesman Wang Yu-chi (王郁琦) said on Friday that Ma had not instructed the Cabinet on addressing the situation because “the stock market problem is for the Executive Yuan to work out.”

Last night, Ma hosted a dinner with Cabinet members, calling on them to remain composed in the face of a tough global situation, to be professional and to take into account public opinion about the stock slump as the Cabinet draws up its measures.
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