The balance of payments (BOP) surplus rose to US$3.7 billion last quarter, from US$3.11 billion three months earlier, as imports declined faster than exports and capital flight intensified, the central bank said yesterday.
The latest BOP figures — including current, financial and capital accounts — detailed money Taiwan paid or received during the July-to-September period as a result of goods and services flows.
The current account, a critical gauge of Taiwan’s export-oriented economy, saw its surplus widen to US$8.42 billion last quarter, up 13.5 percent from the same period, the central bank’s quarterly report showed.
“While exports contracted 2.2 percent year-on-year, imports dropped a bigger 3.4 percent, boosting the current account surplus by US$680 million,” Lin Shu-hua (林淑華), deputy chief of the central bank’s economic research department, told a press conference.
Slower imports may not be a good sign for the economy because raw material imports are critical to the production of goods for exports, Lin said.
The financial account recorded a net outflow of US$8.15 billion last quarter, from a revised US$7.76 billion in the second quarter, the ninth consecutive quarter and second-longest period of capital flight since the global financial crisis, the report said.
Portfolio investment by Taiwanese registered a record outflow of US$17.21 billion last quarter, as life insurance companies increased stakes overseas in light of limited investment options at home, Lin said.
“The trend is likely to persist unless the local market can offer more investment products and services,” Lin said.
However, life insurers will have more difficulty parking idle funds in Taiwan after the Financial Supervisory Commission on Monday raised minimum yields on real-estate investments from 2.125 percent to 2.875 percent, in a bid to curb commercial property price hikes.
Foreigners also cut investments, chiefly in government bonds, with their portfolio registering a net outflow of US$110 million in the third quarter, Lin said.
Fund outflows may extend sluggish trading in the local bourse with major players sidelined, Lin said.
SEMICONDUCTORS: The German laser and plasma generator company will expand its local services as its specialized offerings support Taiwan’s semiconductor industries Trumpf SE + Co KG, a global leader in supplying laser technology and plasma generators used in chip production, is expanding its investments in Taiwan in an effort to deeply integrate into the global semiconductor supply chain in the pursuit of growth. The company, headquartered in Ditzingen, Germany, has invested significantly in a newly inaugurated regional technical center for plasma generators in Taoyuan, its latest expansion in Taiwan after being engaged in various industries for more than 25 years. The center, the first of its kind Trumpf built outside Germany, aims to serve customers from Taiwan, Japan, Southeast Asia and South Korea,
Gasoline and diesel prices at domestic fuel stations are to fall NT$0.2 per liter this week, down for a second consecutive week, CPC Corp, Taiwan (台灣中油) and Formosa Petrochemical Corp (台塑石化) announced yesterday. Effective today, gasoline prices at CPC and Formosa stations are to drop to NT$26.4, NT$27.9 and NT$29.9 per liter for 92, 95 and 98-octane unleaded gasoline respectively, the companies said in separate statements. The price of premium diesel is to fall to NT$24.8 per liter at CPC stations and NT$24.6 at Formosa pumps, they said. The price adjustments came even as international crude oil prices rose last week, as traders
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), which supplies advanced chips to Nvidia Corp and Apple Inc, yesterday reported NT$1.046 trillion (US$33.1 billion) in revenue for last quarter, driven by constantly strong demand for artificial intelligence (AI) chips, falling in the upper end of its forecast. Based on TSMC’s financial guidance, revenue would expand about 22 percent sequentially to the range from US$32.2 billion to US$33.4 billion during the final quarter of 2024, it told investors in October last year. Last year in total, revenue jumped 31.61 percent to NT$3.81 trillion, compared with NT$2.89 trillion generated in the year before, according to
PRECEDENTED TIMES: In news that surely does not shock, AI and tech exports drove a banner for exports last year as Taiwan’s economic growth experienced a flood tide Taiwan’s exports delivered a blockbuster finish to last year with last month’s shipments rising at the second-highest pace on record as demand for artificial intelligence (AI) hardware and advanced computing remained strong, the Ministry of Finance said yesterday. Exports surged 43.4 percent from a year earlier to US$62.48 billion last month, extending growth to 26 consecutive months. Imports climbed 14.9 percent to US$43.04 billion, the second-highest monthly level historically, resulting in a trade surplus of US$19.43 billion — more than double that of the year before. Department of Statistics Director-General Beatrice Tsai (蔡美娜) described the performance as “surprisingly outstanding,” forecasting export growth
RSS