ELECTRONICS
Young Fast loses NT$902m
Touchpanel maker Young Fast Optoelectronics Co (洋華光電), which counts Samsung Electronics Co as its top client, posted a bigger quarterly loss of NT$902 million (US$28.86 million) for last quarter after booking an asset loss of NT$682 million. The company lost NT$429 million in the third quarter of last year. That brought the company’s total loss last year to NT$1.81 billion, deepening from a loss of NT$1.63 billion in 2012. Young Fast posted a loss for a third straight year last year. Company chairman Albert Pai (白志強) told investors yesterday that this year would be another difficult period for the company because of an ongoing price decline. The company will continue to cut costs by streamlining its workforce.
STEEL
EU imposes tariffs
The EU has imposed tariffs as high as 25.2 percent on stainless steel from China and Taiwan to curb competition for EU producers, such as Acerinox SA and Outokumpu Oyj. The duties punish Chinese and Taiwanese exporters of cold-rolled flat products for allegedly selling them in the EU’s 5.5 billion euro (US$6 billion) market below cost, a practice known as dumping. This kind of steel is used in everything from elevators and tanks to boilers and kitchen equipment. EU producers that also include Acciai Speciali Terni SpA and Aperam suffered “material injury” as a result of dumped imports from China and Taiwan, the European Commission, the 28-nation EU’s trade authority in Brussels, said yesterday in the Official Journal. The levies, which take effect today, are for six months and may be extended for five years.
TRADE
Cross-strait talks next week
The 10th round of the cross-strait trade in goods talks will be held starting on Tuesday next week at the earliest in China, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Given that Beijing and Seoul have initiated their free-trade pact, Taiwan will work on getting more favorable tax treatments than South Korea from Beijing during the three-day talks, Vice Minister Bill Cho (卓士昭) told a press conference. Bureau of Foreign Trade Director-General Yang Jen-ni (楊珍妮) will lead Taiwan’s negotiation team, while Bejing’s team is likely to again be led by Chen Xing (陳星), head of the Chinese Ministry of Commerce’s Department of Taiwan, Hong Kong and Macau Affairs, the ministry said.
ECONOMY
Money supply increasing
The nation’s money supply increased year-on-year last month with the broad gauge advancing faster than the narrow indicator, extending the so-called “death cross,” the central bank said yesterday. The broad M2 money supply gained 6.51 percent year-on-year last month, while the narrow money supply reading of M1B rose by 6.12 percent, ending six months of slowdown, the bank said. The bank dismissed concerns of a possible liquidity crunch, citing net foreign fund inflows for the past two months.
SMARTPHONES
Apple leads Taiwan’s market
Apple Inc led Taiwan’s smartphone market in sales volume and sales value, and had the best-selling single model for the fifth consecutive month last month, according to statistics released yesterday by industry sources. A total of 771,000 smartphones were sold in Taiwan last month, down 3.4 percent from a month earlier, the figures showed.
KEEPING UP: The acquisition of a cleanroom in Taiwan would enable Micron to increase production in a market where demand continues to outpace supply, a Micron official said Micron Technology Inc has signed a letter of intent to buy a fabrication site in Taiwan from Powerchip Semiconductor Manufacturing Corp (力積電) for US$1.8 billion to expand its production of memory chips. Micron would take control of the P5 site in Miaoli County’s Tongluo Township (銅鑼) and plans to ramp up DRAM production in phases after the transaction closes in the second quarter, the company said in a statement on Saturday. The acquisition includes an existing 12 inch fab cleanroom of 27,871m2 and would further position Micron to address growing global demand for memory solutions, the company said. Micron expects the transaction to
Vincent Wei led fellow Singaporean farmers around an empty Malaysian plot, laying out plans for a greenhouse and rows of leafy vegetables. What he pitched was not just space for crops, but a lifeline for growers struggling to make ends meet in a city-state with high prices and little vacant land. The future agriculture hub is part of a joint special economic zone launched last year by the two neighbors, expected to cost US$123 million and produce 10,000 tonnes of fresh produce annually. It is attracting Singaporean farmers with promises of cheaper land, labor and energy just over the border.
US actor Matthew McConaughey has filed recordings of his image and voice with US patent authorities to protect them from unauthorized usage by artificial intelligence (AI) platforms, a representative said earlier this week. Several video clips and audio recordings were registered by the commercial arm of the Just Keep Livin’ Foundation, a non-profit created by the Oscar-winning actor and his wife, Camila, according to the US Patent and Trademark Office database. Many artists are increasingly concerned about the uncontrolled use of their image via generative AI since the rollout of ChatGPT and other AI-powered tools. Several US states have adopted
A proposed billionaires’ tax in California has ignited a political uproar in Silicon Valley, with tech titans threatening to leave the state while California Governor Gavin Newsom of the Democratic Party maneuvers to defeat a levy that he fears would lead to an exodus of wealth. A technology mecca, California has more billionaires than any other US state — a few hundred, by some estimates. About half its personal income tax revenue, a financial backbone in the nearly US$350 billion budget, comes from the top 1 percent of earners. A large healthcare union is attempting to place a proposal before
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