Foreign exchange reserves fall
The nation’s foreign-exchange reserves dropped to US$421.47 billion last month, down US$10 million from the level in October, due to the depreciation of euro and other reserve currencies against the US dollar, the central bank said yesterday.
The euro weakened 1.03 percent last month, while the British pound dropped 1.92 percent versus the greenback, the central bank said. The local currency also softened 1.81 percent last month, despite a net fund inflow of US$2.7 billion, the central bank said.
ITRI signs deal with FlexUP
The Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI, 工研院) yesterday signed a patent and trademark licensing agreement with FlexUP Technologies Corp (宇威材料科技) for the development of flexible display materials.
ITRI said it has succeeded in developing flexible universal panel (FlexUP) display technology, which integrates a silicon-based transistor array on a pliable transparent polyimide substrate to fabricate flexible thin-film devices.
The licensing deal is expected to help FlexUP Technologies tap into fast-growing market segments such as wrist-worn devices, smart handheld devices and flexible medical sensors, according to ITRI.
CTBC inks deal with 77 Bank
CTBC Bank Co (中國信託銀行) yesterday signed a memorandum of understanding with The 77 Bank Ltd of Japan to strengthen business collaboration and better serve their customers in the two countries.
CTBC said in a statement that The 77 Bank has a network of 141 branches covering the northern part of Honshu, Japan’s largest island.
Largan reports record sales
Largan Precision Co (大立光), the world’s largest handset camera lens supplier, yesterday said that sales rose to a record high of NT$5.62 billion (US$180.2 million) last month on the back of strong demand for Apple Inc’s new iPhone products.
The number was up 76.63 percent from a year ago and 3.04 percent from the previous month, bringing its cumulative sales during the first 11 months to NT$40.03 billion, up 65.14 percent year-on-year.
Catcher sees rise in revenue
Catcher Technology Co (可成), which supplies metal casings for Apple Inc’s iPhones and iPads, yesterday reported revenues of NT$5.55 billion for last month, surging 19.34 percent year-on-year and up 2.58 percent month-on-month.
In the first 11 months this year, Catcher’s cumulative sales totaled NT$49.22 billion, up 25.15 percent from last year’s NT$39.33 billion.
Simplo reports revenue rise
Simplo Technology Co (新普科技), the nation’s largest notebook battery pack maker, yesterday reported monthly revenues of NT$6.51 billion for last month, up 8.46 percent from a year earlier and 9.41 percent from the previous month, according to a company filing with the Taiwan Stock Exchange.
Overall, the company’s revenues totaled NT$53.46 billion in the first 11 months of this year, up 9.1 percent from last year’s NT$49 billion.
AUO reports drop in revenue
AU Optronics Corp (友達光電), the nation’s second-largest LCD panel maker, yesterday posted its lowest monthly revenue in six months for last month at NT$34.77 billion, down 1.8 percent year-on-year and 6 percent month-on-month.
Shipments of PC and TV panels declined 6 percent last month from the previous month to 9.71 million units, while those of small and medium-sized panels fell 17.3 percent to 13.48 million units.
Green Energy revenue drops
Green Energy Technology Inc (綠能科技), the nation’s top solar wafer maker, yesterday said revenue last month rose 14.17 percent from a year earlier, but shrank 5.63 percent from the previous month to NT$1.46 billion.
The company’s utilization stood unchanged at 95 percent last month from October. Shipments were also flat last month, the company said in a statement.
Green Energy said average selling prices would fall in the short term due to the US’ announcement of anti-dumping and anti-subsidy investigations into Taiwanese and Chinese solar companies.
Sercomm revenue up 2 percent
Local telecommunications equipment maker Sercomm Corp (中磊) said yesterday revenue for last month rose 28.36 percent year-on-year and 2 percent month-on-month to NT$2.08 billion.
The company is working to reduce sales contribution from low-margin products as the industry braces against growing demand for long-term evolution and the Internet of the Things businesses.
On the back of its product-mix improvement, Sercomm’s cumulative revenues for the first 11 months of the year totaled NT$20.96 billion, the highest in the company’s history and up 20.15 percent year-on-year.
Tigerair announces specials
Budget airline Tigerair Taiwan (台灣虎航) yesterday announced an offer of cheap tickets to Thailand and Singapore. The airline said a total of 5,000 NT$555 tickets to Bangkok and Chiang Mai in Thailand and NT$1,555 tickets to Singapore would be available online between 6pm yesterday and 11:59pm on Monday next week.
Tigerair’s offer came after V Air (威航) said it would provide 15,000 NT$520 tickets for one-way flights on the Taipei-Chiang Mai and Taipei-Bangkok routes from 10am yesterday to 11:59pm today. The carrier’s promotional campaign, which began two days ago, was suspended as its ticketing system broke down due to a sudden influx of online buyers.
The New Taiwan dollar is on the verge of overtaking the yuan as Asia’s best carry-trade target given its lower risk of interest-rate and currency volatility. A strategy of borrowing the New Taiwan dollar to invest in higher-yielding alternatives has generated the second-highest return over the past month among Asian currencies behind the yuan, based on the Sharpe ratio that measures risk-adjusted relative returns. The New Taiwan dollar may soon replace its Chinese peer as the region’s favored carry trade tool, analysts say, citing Beijing’s efforts to support the yuan that can create wild swings in borrowing costs. In contrast,
Nvidia Corp’s demand for advanced packaging from Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) remains strong though the kind of technology it needs is changing, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) said yesterday, after he was asked whether the company was cutting orders. Nvidia’s most advanced artificial intelligence (AI) chip, Blackwell, consists of multiple chips glued together using a complex chip-on-wafer-on-substrate (CoWoS) advanced packaging technology offered by TSMC, Nvidia’s main contract chipmaker. “As we move into Blackwell, we will use largely CoWoS-L. Of course, we’re still manufacturing Hopper, and Hopper will use CowoS-S. We will also transition the CoWoS-S capacity to CoWos-L,” Huang said
Nvidia Corp CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) is expected to miss the inauguration of US president-elect Donald Trump on Monday, bucking a trend among high-profile US technology leaders. Huang is visiting East Asia this week, as he typically does around the time of the Lunar New Year, a person familiar with the situation said. He has never previously attended a US presidential inauguration, said the person, who asked not to be identified, because the plans have not been announced. That makes Nvidia an exception among the most valuable technology companies, most of which are sending cofounders or CEOs to the event. That includes
INDUSTRY LEADER: TSMC aims to continue outperforming the industry’s growth and makes 2025 another strong growth year, chairman and CEO C.C. Wei says Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), a major chip supplier to Nvidia Corp and Apple Inc, yesterday said it aims to grow revenue by about 25 percent this year, driven by robust demand for artificial intelligence (AI) chips. That means TSMC would continue to outpace the foundry industry’s 10 percent annual growth this year based on the chipmaker’s estimate. The chipmaker expects revenue from AI-related chips to double this year, extending a three-fold increase last year. The growth would quicken over the next five years at a compound annual growth rate of 45 percent, fueled by strong demand for the high-performance computing
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