TAIEX down 0.17 percent
Share prices closed lower yesterday, with the TAIEX falling 13.42 points, or 0.17 percent, to close at 7,585.3.
The local bourse opened at 7,630.1 and fluctuated between 7,560.89 and 7,637.99. Market turnover totaled NT$82.13 billion (US$2.58 billion).
Five of the major stock categories gained ground, with paper and pulp issues gaining the most at 0.69 percent, followed by financial and banking stocks at 0.5 percent. Cement issues rose 0.17 percent, foodstuff shares moved up 0.14 percent, and construction shares were up 0.04 percent.
Foreign investors and Chinese qualified domestic institutional investors were net buyers of NT$94 million in shares.
Foreign firms may issue TDRs
The Taiwan Stock Exchange Corp (TWSE) said yesterday that several US and Japan-listed companies might issue Taiwan depository receipts (TDRs) on the TAIEX this year.
An unidentified NASDAQ-listed company might submit an application as early as the third quarter of this year, TWSE chairman Schive Chi (薛琦) said after attending the listing ceremony of US-based integrated circuit designer Integrated Memory Logic Ltd (IML) — the first foreign company to have its initial public offering in Taiwan.
Schive said the company expressed strong interest in issuing TDRs at a business promotion event held by the TWSE in Hong Kong in which more than 100 listed companies with an average market capital of NT$50 billion participated.
Schive said 57 foreign companies have expressed interest in launching IPOs in Taiwan, and TPK Holding Co — a provider of touch technology products and services — might be the second foreign company to go public in Taiwan after the IML listing.
IML shares shot up 70 percent to close at NT$243 on their first trading day amid optimism over the company’s earnings outlook, analysts said.
Shanghai plan boosts airlines
EVA Airways Corp (長榮航空) and China Airlines Ltd (中華航空) rose in Taipei trading after the Taipei City Government Web site cited Taipei Mayor Hau Lung-bin (郝龍斌) as saying he aims to have direct flights between Taipei’s Songshan Airport and Shanghai’s Hongqiao Airport, hopefully by the middle of next month.
EVA stock gained 4.2 percent to close at NT$17.40 in Taipei, while China Airlines advanced almost 2 percent to close at NT$13.1.
China Telecom to offer Storm
Research In Motion Ltd (RIM) will start selling its BlackBerry Storm smartphone with China Telecom Corp (中國電信) as it tries to gain an edge over rival China Unicom (Hong Kong) Ltd (中國聯通), the local carrier of Apple Inc’s iPhone.
China Telecom is offering the touch-screen Storm for its business users, according to an e-mailed statement. The carrier will initially make the e-mail device available in 16 of China’s 31 provinces.
RIM is looking to Asia as sales growth there outstrips the US, where the company gets more than half its revenue. Waterloo, Ontario-based RIM said in December that it will offer a handset customized for a locally developed Chinese technology with China Mobile.
The Storm, which debuted in the US in November 2008, was criticized for its screen design and early software glitches, prompting RIM to introduce the Storm2 last October.
NT dollar rebounds
One day after its sharp 0.8 percent decline, the New Taiwan dollar yesterday regained NT$0.122, or 0.38 percent, to close at NT$31.978 against the greenback on turnover of US$953 million.
ADVANCED: Previously, Taiwanese chip companies were restricted from building overseas fabs with technology less than two generations behind domestic factories Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), a major chip supplier to Nvidia Corp, would no longer be restricted from investing in next-generation 2-nanometer chip production in the US, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. However, the ministry added that the world’s biggest contract chipmaker would not be making any reckless decisions, given the weight of its up to US$30 billion investment. To safeguard Taiwan’s chip technology advantages, the government has barred local chipmakers from making chips using more advanced technologies at their overseas factories, in China particularly. Chipmakers were previously only allowed to produce chips using less advanced technologies, specifically
The New Taiwan dollar is on the verge of overtaking the yuan as Asia’s best carry-trade target given its lower risk of interest-rate and currency volatility. A strategy of borrowing the New Taiwan dollar to invest in higher-yielding alternatives has generated the second-highest return over the past month among Asian currencies behind the yuan, based on the Sharpe ratio that measures risk-adjusted relative returns. The New Taiwan dollar may soon replace its Chinese peer as the region’s favored carry trade tool, analysts say, citing Beijing’s efforts to support the yuan that can create wild swings in borrowing costs. In contrast,
TARIFF SURGE: The strong performance could be attributed to the growing artificial intelligence device market and mass orders ahead of potential US tariffs, analysts said The combined revenue of companies listed on the Taiwan Stock Exchange and the Taipei Exchange for the whole of last year totaled NT$44.66 trillion (US$1.35 trillion), up 12.8 percent year-on-year and hit a record high, data compiled by investment consulting firm CMoney showed on Saturday. The result came after listed firms reported a 23.92 percent annual increase in combined revenue for last month at NT$4.1 trillion, the second-highest for the month of December on record, and posted a 15.63 percent rise in combined revenue for the December quarter at NT$12.25 billion, the highest quarterly figure ever, the data showed. Analysts attributed the
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co’s (TSMC, 台積電) quarterly sales topped estimates, reinforcing investor hopes that the torrid pace of artificial intelligence (AI) hardware spending would extend into this year. The go-to chipmaker for Nvidia Corp and Apple Inc reported a 39 percent rise in December-quarter revenue to NT$868.5 billion (US$26.35 billion), based on calculations from monthly disclosures. That compared with an average estimate of NT$854.7 billion. The strong showing from Taiwan’s largest company bolsters expectations that big tech companies from Alphabet Inc to Microsoft Corp would continue to build and upgrade datacenters at a rapid clip to propel AI development. Growth accelerated for
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