LABOR
Demand up in Taiwan
Workforce demand in Taiwan is projected to increase by 40,768 people by July 31 from the April 30 level, representing a drop in growth compared with the same period of last year and of 2011, according to the results of a Council of Labor Affairs (CLA) survey released yesterday. The projected net growth for next month from the April level declined by 8,309 people, compared with a rise of 49,077 in the same period last year, the survey showed. Employers in the manufacturing sector expect to hire 24,400 more employees next month than they did in April, while those in the services sector expect to hire 16,300 more, according to the survey, which was conducted between April 22 and May 10.
SEMICONDUCTORS
Inotera profit rises again
DRAM chipmaker Inotera Memories Inc (華亞科技) on Monday posted its second monthly net profit on rising prices, boding well for the company to swing back to profit this quarter. Net proft was NT$1.06 billion (US$35.5 million), or NT$0.2 per share, last month, up from NT$1.125 billion, or NT$0.21 per share, in April, while revenue for last month grew 20.64 percent to NT$4.15 billion, the highest level since April 2010, the company’s stock exchange filing showed. Inotera chairman Charles Kau (高啟全) said in April that the second quarter would be “much better” than the first quarter in terms of chip price and profitability.
To many, Tatu City on the outskirts of Nairobi looks like a success. The first city entirely built by a private company to be operational in east Africa, with about 25,000 people living and working there, it accounts for about two-thirds of all foreign investment in Kenya. Its low-tax status has attracted more than 100 businesses including Heineken, coffee brand Dormans, and the biggest call-center and cold-chain transport firms in the region. However, to some local politicians, Tatu City has looked more like a target for extortion. A parade of governors have demanded land worth millions of dollars in exchange
Hong Kong authorities ramped up sales of the local dollar as the greenback’s slide threatened the foreign-exchange peg. The Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) sold a record HK$60.5 billion (US$7.8 billion) of the city’s currency, according to an alert sent on its Bloomberg page yesterday in Asia, after it tested the upper end of its trading band. That added to the HK$56.1 billion of sales versus the greenback since Friday. The rapid intervention signals efforts from the city’s authorities to limit the local currency’s moves within its HK$7.75 to HK$7.85 per US dollar trading band. Heavy sales of the local dollar by
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co’s (TSMC, 台積電) revenue jumped 48 percent last month, underscoring how electronics firms scrambled to acquire essential components before global tariffs took effect. The main chipmaker for Apple Inc and Nvidia Corp reported monthly sales of NT$349.6 billion (US$11.6 billion). That compares with the average analysts’ estimate for a 38 percent rise in second-quarter revenue. US President Donald Trump’s trade war is prompting economists to retool GDP forecasts worldwide, casting doubt over the outlook for everything from iPhone demand to computing and datacenter construction. However, TSMC — a barometer for global tech spending given its central role in the
The Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC) yesterday met with some of the nation’s largest insurance companies as a skyrocketing New Taiwan dollar piles pressure on their hundreds of billions of dollars in US bond investments. The commission has asked some life insurance firms, among the biggest Asian holders of US debt, to discuss how the rapidly strengthening NT dollar has impacted their operations, people familiar with the matter said. The meeting took place as the NT dollar jumped as much as 5 percent yesterday, its biggest intraday gain in more than three decades. The local currency surged as exporters rushed to
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