■ Investor caution slows market
Shares closed little changed yesterday as caution continued to prevail ahead of corporate disclosures of fourth-quarter earnings and guidance for the year ahead, dealers said.
The TAIEX closed up 9.89 points or 0.13 percent at 7,852.36, on turnover of NT$113.87 billion (US$3.45 billion).
Decliners outnumbered gainers 619 to 552, with 211 stocks unchanged.
On the Taipei foreign exchange market, the NT dollar traded NT$0.027 lower against the US dollar to close at NT$32.947.
Turnover was US$963 million.
■ More fuel price cuts
Formosa Petrochemical Corp (台塑石化), the nation's second-biggest fuel supplier, cut gasoline and diesel prices, matching reductions by Chinese Petroleum Corp (CPC, 中油) after crude oil costs declined.
The company would reduce domestic wholesale gasoline prices by NT$0.40 a liter and diesel by NT$0.50 at 10pm yesterday, Formosa Petrochemical said in a faxed statement.
■ UMC looks to cut capital
The United Microelectronics Corp (UMC, 聯電) board yesterday announced a capital reduction proposal, subject to approval at an extraordinary shareholders' meeting scheduled for June 11.
The world's second-largest made-to-order chipmaker said its board decided to cut capital by 30 percent, or NT$57.39 billion (US$1.74 billion), to NT$133.92 billion, CNA reported.
The proposal will allow the firm to improve its capitalization structure and enhance shareholders' interests, CNA said, adding that UMC plans to return NT$3 per share.
Demand for artificial intelligence (AI) chips should spur growth for the semiconductor industry over the next few years, the CEO of a major supplier to Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) said, dismissing concerns that investors had misjudged the pace and extent of spending on AI. While the global chip market has grown about 8 percent annually over the past 20 years, AI semiconductors should grow at a much higher rate going forward, Scientech Corp (辛耘) chief executive officer Hsu Ming-chi (許明琪) told Bloomberg Television. “This booming of the AI industry has just begun,” Hsu said. “For the most prominent
Former Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) chairman Mark Liu (劉德音) yesterday warned against the tendency to label stakeholders as either “pro-China” or “pro-US,” calling such rigid thinking a “trap” that could impede policy discussions. Liu, an adviser to the Cabinet’s Economic Development Committee, made the comments in his keynote speech at the committee’s first advisers’ meeting. Speaking in front of Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰), National Development Council (NDC) Minister Paul Liu (劉鏡清) and other officials, Liu urged the public to be wary of falling into the “trap” of categorizing people involved in discussions into either the “pro-China” or “pro-US” camp. Liu,
Minister of Economic Affairs J.W. Kuo (郭智輝) yesterday said Taiwan’s government plans to set up a business service company in Kyushu, Japan, to help Taiwanese companies operating there. “The company will follow the one-stop service model similar to the science parks we have in Taiwan,” Kuo said. “As each prefecture is providing different conditions, we will establish a new company providing services and helping Taiwanese companies swiftly settle in Japan.” Kuo did not specify the exact location of the planned company but said it would not be in Kumamoto, the Kyushu prefecture in which Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Company (TSMC, 台積電) has a
China has threatened severe economic retaliation against Japan if Tokyo further restricts sales and servicing of chipmaking equipment to Chinese firms, complicating US-led efforts to cut the world’s second-largest economy off from advanced technology. Senior Chinese officials have repeatedly outlined that position in recent meetings with their Japanese counterparts, people familiar with the matter said. Toyota Motor Corp privately told officials in Tokyo that one specific fear in Japan is that Beijing could react to new semiconductor controls by cutting the country’s access to critical minerals essential for automotive production, the people said, declining to be named discussing private affairs. Toyota is among
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