Formosa Chemicals OKs dividend
Shareholders of Formosa Chemicals & Fibre Corp (台灣化學纖維), which produces aromatics and styrenics, yesterday approved the company’s plan to distribute cash dividend of NT$2.5, based on its earnings per share of NT$4.25 it posted a year ago.
Formosa Chemicals chairman William Wong (王文淵) told shareholders that he is pessimistic about the company’s outlook this quarter because prices for its products paraxylene and styrene monomer are lower this quarter than a year ago because of oversupply in China.
Sales of the two products accounted for 32.3 percent of its revenue last year, the company said.
FSC approves investment cap
The Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC) yesterday approved plans to raise the cap on overseas investment for securities firms from the current 40 percent to 100 percent of their net worth.
The deregulation is intended to give them more flexibility to expand overseas and grow into regional champions, the commission said.
Public more upbeat on economy
The public’s confidence on the domestic economic outlook staged a comeback this month, ending three months of decline, after the TAIEX reclaimed the 9,200-point level, a survey by Cathay Financial Holding Co (國泰金控) showed yesterday.
Optimistic respondents outnumbered pessimistic peers this month when asked about the economy and the local bourse going forward, the survey found, attributing the sentiment pickup chiefly to recent rallies in local shares.
Hwa Fong Rubber secures loan
Hwa Fong Rubber Industry Co (華豐橡膠) yesterday secured a syndicated loan from eight Taiwanese banks, that includes NT$1.2 billion (US$40 million) for its own use and US$10.76 million for its British Virgin Islands-based investment holding subsidiary, the company said in a filing to the Taiwan Stock Exchange.
The loan will be used by the company to fund its mid-term operations and repay bank loans, the Changhwa-based company said.
The eight lenders are led by Industrial Bank of Taiwan (台灣工業銀行), it added.
Feng Tay posts record profit
Feng Tay Enterprise Co (豐泰鞋業), which supplies about one-sixth of Nike Inc footwear, yesterday reported net profit of NT$1.32 billion, or NT$2.11 per share, for the first five months of the year, compared with the NT$638.38 million, or NT$1.02 per share, a year earlier.
From January through last month, the company’s cumulative revenue rose 20.84 percent to NT$18.1 billion from a year earlier, the company said in a filing to the stock exchange said.
The company announced on Friday last week that it would invest US$16 million in Vietnam and NT$55 million in Taiwan this year to increase production capacity.
Sanyang shares plunge
Sanyang Industrial Co (三陽工業), which makes motorcycles and cars in Taiwan, yesterday saw its shares fall by the daily maximum of 7 percent to close at NT$28.85 in Taipei trading, after the financial regulator said the company’s shares would be banned from margin trading from today.
The announcement came ahead of a potential proxy vote war in the company’s boardroom tomorrow.
The stock exchange said all transactions of the shares will have to be conducted in cash, because of Sanyang’s decision to hold its annual general meeting at a place that does not meet the government’s public safety requirements.
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
HSBC Holdings PLC is deepening its commitment to Taiwan as the economy emerges as one of the bank’s fastest-growing markets globally, driven by an artificial intelligence (AI) investment boom, expanding cross-border trade, and rising wealth creation. “The advantage that Taiwan has is a growth story linked to the semiconductor and broader AI industries, strong underlying corporate performance, and wealth creation,” said Surendra Rosha, HSBC’s co-chief executive for Asia and the Middle East, in an exclusive interview with the Taipei Times on June 2, during this year’s HSBC Taiwan Conference. That combination has helped HSBC cement its position as the most profitable international
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
Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) yesterday said it would work with US chipmaker Intel Corp to jointly develop and deploy next-generation artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure and intelligent computing platforms in a move to capture booming demand for AI computing systems. Hon Hai, also known as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康), said in a statement that the partnership would combine its global manufacturing scale, system integration expertise and AI data center deployment capabilities with Intel’s strengths in processor architecture, silicon technologies and software ecosystem. The companies said they plan to work on equipment used in AI data centers, including server racks powered by
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