TAIEX slips 0.24%
The TAIEX closed down 0.24 percent yesterday on a mild correction from the previous session, but ample funds helped to keep the market above the 8,800 point mark, dealers said.
The weighted index fell 21.55 points to 8,870.76 on turnover of NT$101.34 billion (US$3.42 billion).
“With many foreign institutional investors remaining away from the trading floor ahead of the New Year holiday, the local bourse appeared quiet, moving in a narrow range,” Horizon Securities (宏遠證券) analyst Benson Huang said.
Huang said a lackluster Wall Street overnight failed to provide any meaningful indication to the local market.
HTC appoints new COO
HTC Corp (宏達電), the world’s No. 5 smartphone brand, yesterday said it has appointed Matthew Costello as new chief operating officer.
The latest personnel shuffle came after HTC appointed Winston Yung (容覺生) last week as new chief executive, replacing H.M Cheng (鄭慧明).
Costello will be based in Taiwan and will oversee all operations from manufacturing, supply chain and sourcing to customer services and technology infrastructure. He will report to Fred Liu (劉慶東), who has been promoted to president of engineering, operations and sales.
President Chain launches Wi-Fi
President Chain Store Corp (統一超商), operator of 7-11 convenience stores, launched its own Wi-Fi service, yesterday, making it the nation’s first retailer offering its own wireless Internet access service.
President Chain Store said that it expected to have 1 million subscribers for the new Wi-Fi service within an unspecified period of time.
Yieh invests in Guangzhou plant
Yieh United Steel Corp’s (燁聯) board approved investing an additional US$116.7 million in a -stainless steel unit in Guangzhou (聯眾(廣州)不銹鋼) in southern China, the Kaohsiung-based company said in a statement to the stock exchange yesterday.
The board also approved plans for Yieh United Steel and five other units to invest a combined US$95 million in a nickel plant, the company said in a separate statement.
Giantplus to sell bonds
Giantplus Technology Co’s (凌巨) board approved a plan to sell up to NT$1 billion in five-year unsecured domestic convertible bonds at zero coupon, the company said in a statement to the local stock exchange yesterday.
The proceeds will be used to repay bank loans, the Miaoli county-based maker of flat panel modules said.
Fubon buys non-performing loans
Fubon Financial Holding Co (富邦金控) said its Fubon AMC Ltd (富邦資產管理) unit bought NT$6.3 billion in non-performing loans from The Chinese Bank (中華商銀), Taitung Business Bank (台東區中小企銀) and BOWA Bank (寶華商銀) from the Central Deposit Insurance Co (中央存保), it said in a statement to the Taiwan stock exchange yesterday.
CPC to boost No. 4 utilization
CPC Corp, Taiwan (CPC, 台灣中油), Taiwan’s state-run oil company, plans to boost the utilization rate at its No. 4 naphtha cracker to 90 percent today.
The company resumed production at the plant on Monday after maintenance, vice president Paul Chen (陳綠蔚) said by telephone. The No. 4 plant was closed on Nov. 3 for scheduled repairs, he said.
CPC has also been running its No. 3 and No. 5 naphtha crackers at 90 percent of capacity, according to Chen.
PERSISTENT RUMORS: Nvidia’s CEO said the firm is not in talks to sell AI chips to China, but he would welcome a change in US policy barring the activity Nvidia Corp CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) said his company is not in discussions to sell its Blackwell artificial intelligence (AI) chips to Chinese firms, waving off speculation it is trying to engineer a return to the world’s largest semiconductor market. Huang, who arrived in Taiwan yesterday ahead of meetings with longtime partner Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), took the opportunity to clarify recent comments about the US-China AI race. The Nvidia head caused a stir in an interview this week with the Financial Times, in which he was quoted as saying “China will win” the AI race. Huang yesterday said
Japanese technology giant Softbank Group Corp said Tuesday it has sold its stake in Nvidia Corp, raising US$5.8 billion to pour into other investments. It also reported its profit nearly tripled in the first half of this fiscal year from a year earlier. Tokyo-based Softbank said it sold the stake in Silicon Vally-based Nvidia last month, a move that reflects its shift in focus to OpenAI, owner of the artificial intelligence (AI) chatbot ChatGPT. Softbank reported its profit in the April-to-September period soared to about 2.5 trillion yen (about US$13 billion). Its sales for the six month period rose 7.7 percent year-on-year
Nissan Motor Co has agreed to sell its global headquarters in Yokohama for ￥97 billion (US$630 million) to a group sponsored by Taiwanese autoparts maker Minth Group (敏實集團), as the struggling automaker seeks to shore up its financial position. The acquisition is led by a special purchase company managed by KJR Management Ltd, a Japanese real-estate unit of private equity giant KKR & Co, people familiar with the matter said. KJR said it would act as asset manager together with Mizuho Real Estate Management Co. Nissan is undergoing a broad cost-cutting campaign by eliminating jobs and shuttering plants as it grapples
MORE WEIGHT: The national weighting was raised in one index while holding steady in two others, while several companies rose or fell in prominence MSCI Inc, a global index provider, has raised Taiwan’s weighting in one of its major indices and left the country’s weighting unchanged in two other indices after a regular index review. In a statement released on Thursday, MSCI said it has upgraded Taiwan’s weighting in the MSCI All-Country World Index by 0.02 percentage points to 2.25 percent, while maintaining the weighting in the MSCI Emerging Markets Index, the most closely watched by foreign institutional investors, at 20.46 percent. Additionally, the index provider has left Taiwan’s weighting in the MSCI All-Country Asia ex-Japan Index unchanged at 23.15 percent. The latest index adjustments are to
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