Cigarette surcharge to increase
Legislators of the ruling and opposition parties reached a preliminary decision yesterday to increase the surcharge on cigarettes, beginning on Jan. 1 next year.
If enacted, the law will make Taiwan cigarettes more expensive, because the surcharge will rise from NT$5.00 to NT$8.00 per pack. The increase in the cigarette tax will be used to improve health care.
The legislators also preliminarily decided to adopt a resolution asking the Ministry of Economic Affairs and the Ministry of Finance to continue to negotiate in the World Trade Organization for the exemption of rice wine from taxation.
Forex reserves increase
Taiwan's foreign exchange reserves totaled US$190.57 billion as of the end of September, an increase of US$4.907 billion over the figure recorded at the end of August, the Central Bank of China reported yesterday.
The September figure also represented an increase of US$28.92 billion over the end of last year, the central bank said.
The bank attributed the increase to an influx of foreign capital and earnings from its accounts in foreign commercial banks.
AU Optronics denies rumors
AU Optronics Corp (友達光電) denied a Chinese-language report that said the world's No. 4 flat-panel maker plans to borrow NT$40 billion (US$1.2 billion) from banks to fund a new flat-panel display plant that the company is building in central Taiwan.
The company will have enough money from operations to finance a US$2.3 billion factory near Taichung that will make television-sized screens measuring 30 inches diagonally and larger, according to spokeswoman Anny Chan.
Hsinchu-based AU Optronics expects to be the world's third company to build a so-called sixth-generation plant after Osaka, Japan-based Sharp Corp, which dominates the flat-panel TV business, and LG Philips LCD Co, based in Seoul, South Korea.
Trade with China rises
Trade with China in the seven months to July rose 22.2 percent from last year to US$24.56 billion, the Board of Foreign Trade under the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday.
The amount accounted for 16.6 percent of Taiwan's total external trade, up from 14.7 percent the previous year, the board said.
During the seven-month period, Taiwan registered a trade surplus with China of US$13.10 billion, up 12.6 percent from last year, as exports rose 18.7 percent to US$18.83 billion and imports grew 35.3 percent to US$5.73 billion, it said.
The US$18.83 billion shipments to China accounted for 24 percent of Taiwan's total exports in the first seven months, compared with the 21.6 percent recorded last year, it added.
SARS hits economy hard
The economies of China, Taiwan, Hong Kong and Singapore have been the ones most affected by the outbreaks of SARS, according to a report by the UN.
The 2003 trade and development report released by the UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD) said that China's first-quarter GDP was stagnant, while the Q1 GDP growth of Taiwan and Hong Kong fell noticeably.
Citing an assessment by the Asian Development Bank, the report said the SARS outbreak affected Hong Kong and Singapore the most and China and South Korea the least.
NT dollar trades higher
The New Taiwan dollar yesterday traded higher against its US counterpart, rising NT$0.001 to close at NY$33.767 yesterday on the Taipei foreign exchange market.
Turnover was US$1.21 billion.
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