TAIEX down 3.25%
Shares closed 3.25 percent lower yesterday amid deepening concerns that the current financial turmoil could lead to a severe global recession, dealers said. The weighted index fell 170.29 points to 5,075.97 on turnover of NT$28.65 billion (US$884.26 billion). Decliners outnumbered gainers 1,401 to 181, while 246 stocks were unchanged.
A total of 512 shares were limit-down, against 49 limit-ups.
Financials fell 3.37 percent, electronics dropped 3.32 percent, foods was down 3.29 percent and constructions edged down 1.71 percent.
“As international markets plunged to reflect the growing concerns about the economic downturn, today’s sharp fall at the domestic market was not surprising at all,” said Vickie Hsieh (謝雯霞) of President Securities (統一證券).
The narrowed limit-down on shares originally designed by the government to minimise the impact of the global crisis on the domestic stock market turned out to be a disaster, analysts said.
Accounting draft completed
The Financial Supervisory Commission yesterday said that it had come up with a draft revision to bring national accounting standards in line with changes in international accounting standards. The changes will allow domestic companies not to mark part of their assets to the market.
The revision will be made public today after the Accounting Research and Development Foundation completes the revision, the commission’s chief secretary Lu Ting-chieh (盧廷劼) told a media briefing yesterday.
Under the revision, domestic companies won’t have to report their outstanding losses from “tradable assets” including shares and bonds with a maturity, excluding derivatives, “in the third quarter” if they decide not to liquidate them immediately, Lu said.
The question of whether the revision will be extended in the fourth quarter of this year will be decided later, pending on the future economic and financial development, he said.
Mega unveils US investments
Mega International Commercial Bank Co (兆豐國際商銀), a unit of Taiwan’s fourth-biggest financial group, has NT$9 billion in investments tied to Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc, Merrill Lynch & Co and American International Group Inc.
Mega International has made provisions for the investments, the lender said in an e-mailed statement yesterday. The bank’s parent is Taipei-based Mega Financial Holding Co (兆豐金控).
China tightens supervision
China’s banking watchdog ordered financial institutions yesterday to tighten supervision of credit in the face of the global economic turmoil, state media reported.
The China Banking Regulatory Commission issued new instructions designed to stem the flow of funds into the stock and property markets, Xinhua news agency said.
It ordered banks and other financial players to strengthen credit management and make sure staff did not embezzle funds for investment in the stock market.
NT dollar falls to record
The New Taiwan dollar “is relatively stable,” the central bank said in a faxed statement after the currency fell to a one year low.
The local currency weakened NT$0.137, or 0.42 percent, to close at NT$32.537 against the US dollar yesterday, the Taipei Forex Inc said. The NT dollar earlier dropped as much as 0.6 percent to NT$32.602.
South Korea’s won and Singapore’s dollar posted steeper declines yesterday, the central bank said in the statement.
SEASONAL WEAKNESS: The combined revenue of the top 10 foundries fell 5.4%, but rush orders and China’s subsidies partially offset slowing demand Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) further solidified its dominance in the global wafer foundry business in the first quarter of this year, remaining far ahead of its closest rival, Samsung Electronics Co, TrendForce Corp (集邦科技) said yesterday. TSMC posted US$25.52 billion in sales in the January-to-March period, down 5 percent from the previous quarter, but its market share rose from 67.1 percent the previous quarter to 67.6 percent, TrendForce said in a report. While smartphone-related wafer shipments declined in the first quarter due to seasonal factors, solid demand for artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing (HPC) devices and urgent TV-related orders
BYPASSING CHINA TARIFFS: In the first five months of this year, Foxconn sent US$4.4bn of iPhones to the US from India, compared with US$3.7bn in the whole of last year Nearly all the iPhones exported by Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團) from India went to the US between March and last month, customs data showed, far above last year’s average of 50 percent and a clear sign of Apple Inc’s efforts to bypass high US tariffs imposed on China. The numbers, being reported by Reuters for the first time, show that Apple has realigned its India exports to almost exclusively serve the US market, when previously the devices were more widely distributed to nations including the Netherlands and the Czech Republic. During March to last month, Foxconn, known as Hon Hai Precision Industry
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) and the University of Tokyo (UTokyo) yesterday announced the launch of the TSMC-UTokyo Lab to promote advanced semiconductor research, education and talent development. The lab is TSMC’s first laboratory collaboration with a university outside Taiwan, the company said in a statement. The lab would leverage “the extensive knowledge, experience, and creativity” of both institutions, the company said. It is located in the Asano Section of UTokyo’s Hongo, Tokyo, campus and would be managed by UTokyo faculty, guided by directors from UTokyo and TSMC, the company said. TSMC began working with UTokyo in 2019, resulting in 21 research projects,
Quanta Computer Inc (廣達) chairman Barry Lam (林百里) yesterday expressed a downbeat view about the prospects of humanoid robots, given high manufacturing costs and a lack of target customers. Despite rising demand and high expectations for humanoid robots, high research-and-development costs and uncertain profitability remain major concerns, Lam told reporters following the company’s annual shareholders’ meeting in Taoyuan. “Since it seems a bit unworthy to use such high-cost robots to do household chores, I believe robots designed for specific purposes would be more valuable and present a better business opportunity,” Lam said Instead of investing in humanoid robots, Quanta has opted to invest
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