Taiwanese have poor knowledge about foreign currency investment though many have a foreign currency account and watch the market closely, a survey by DBS Bank Taiwan showed yesterday.
About 50 percent of the respondents owned a foreign currency account, but a surprising 94.3 percent scored below 60 percent on foreign-exchange-related questions, indicating the public lacked the knowledge on the subject, DBS Taiwan general manager Jerry Chen (陳亮丞) said.
“A big majority, 68 percent, believe interest rates are the most important factor when investing in foreign exchange market and overlook that exchange rates play a bigger role in affecting profit,” Chen said.
Investors may gain interest, but still incur losses in the end because fluctuations in the exchange rate can erode interest, especially when the negative interest spread is larger than the yield rate, Chen said.
In terms of currency investments, 53 percent wrongly believed the fewer the currency types, the better the portfolio, Chen said, adding it is better to take advantage of different currencies.
High-yield currencies offer higher interest rates, but carry higher risks, whereas the US dollar serves a better hedging purpose because it holds relatively stable in times of market fluctuations, Chen said.
Although more than 60 percent of respondents said they watch foreign exchange markets closely, 62 percent are not clear about the differences between the four posted rates: cash buy, cash sell, telegraph transfer bank buy and telegraphic transfer bank sell, the survey found.
The greenback is by far the most popular foreign currency, with 85.7 percent keeping the currency, followed by the yuan at 25 percent, the Australian dollar at 19 percent, the euro at 16.2 percent and the Japanese yen at 15.6 percent, according to the survey.
As Taiwan is easing restrictions on yuan investment, an increasing number of Taiwanese will add yuan to their foreign currency portfolio, Chen said, adding that expectations of yuan appreciation could also help boost yuan popularity.
Cairo’s new monorail slices across the city skyline, running above the familiar chaos of blaring horns and aging buses’ exhaust fumes that mark rush hour below. The US$4.5 billion monorail, opened this month, is among Egypt’s most prominent new transport projects, part of a debt-funded infrastructure drive criticized for sapping state finances while bringing limited benefits to most of the country’s 109 million people. “It feels like you’re in a different country,” said Ramy Sayed, a restaurant manager, aboard a driverless Innovia 300 train. “No noise, no traffic, we’re not used to this.” The eastern line runs 56km from the bustling middle-class
Taiwanese firms have increased investment in the Philippines in recent years as Manila’s ties with Washington deepen and global supply chains continue to shift away from China, an expert at the Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research (CIER, 中華經濟研究院) said yesterday. The Philippines had not been among Taiwanese investors’ top choices in Southeast Asia, CIER Taiwan ASEAN Studies Center director Kristy Hsu (徐遵慈) said at a seminar in Taipei. However, Taiwan’s investment in the country has grown significantly since the COVID-19 pandemic, reaching US $257 million last year, a high in recent years, she said. Although Taiwan’s total investment in the Philippines still lags
Intel Corp regards Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) as a longstanding partner, as the US chipmaker would continue outsourcing production of advanced chips to TSMC, Intel chief executive officer Lip-Bu Tan (陳立武) said yesterday. “I don’t look at people as competitors. I look at the collaboration... Nvidia is also, you know, a good friend,” Tan told a news conference following his keynote speech at the Computex trade show in Taipei. “It’s a very trusted partnership for us... We are a big, top customer for them, and we’re going to continue doing that,” he said, referring to TSMC, the world’s largest foundry
Artificial intelligence (AI) agents would supplant smartphones as the center of people’s digital lives, fundamentally reshaping personal devices and driving a major computing upgrade cycle, Qualcomm Inc CEO Cristiano Amon said yesterday. In his keynote speech for this year’s Computex trade show in Taipei, Amon said that the rise of "agentic AI" — AI systems capable of reasoning, planning and carrying out tasks autonomously — would transform how people interact with technology across phones, PCs, vehicles and wearable devices. Describing the technology as the next major evolution in computing, Amon said that "2026 is the year of agents.” For decades, smartphones have sat
RSS