EQUITIES
TAIEX rises 0.94%
The TAIEX rose 0.94 percent yesterday, allowing the main bourse to increase 0.17 percent in the first six months of the year, Taiwan Stock Exchange data showed. The total market value of local stocks increased by NT$260.9 billion (US$8.4 billion) to NT$27.137 trillion as of yesterday from NT$26.876 trillion at the end of last year, translating into an increase of approximately NT$27,000 for each of the 9.5 million investors who held securities accounts last year.
Manufacturing
Weakness persists: TIER
As Taiwan’s export markets softened, the local manufacturing sector’s business climate for May flashed “blue” for the second straight month, implying persistent weakness in the sector, the Taiwan Institute of Economic Research (TIER, 台灣經濟研究院) said yesterday. A closer look at the manufacturing industry shows that the business climate for petrochemicals, automobiles and auto parts, as well as metal products and machine equipment, flashed “blue” last month, while textiles, electronics and electric products flashed “yellow-blue,” the institute said.
AUTOMAKERS
Yulon eyes market share
Yulon Nissan Motor Co (裕隆日產), which distributes Nissan and Infiniti cars, yesterday said its goal is to expand its local market share to 12 percent this year, after it sold 47,700 cars last year for a market share of 11.5 percent. The Taiwanese firm said it also expects gains from its reinvestment in Dongfeng Nissan Passenger Vehicle Co (東風日產), its Chinese joint venture with Dongfeng Motor Corp (東風汽車), which is expected to sell up to 1 million cars this year, compared with 954,000 units last year. The company made the remarks at its annual general meeting in Taipei, in which shareholders approved the company’s plan to distribute a cash dividend of NT$30 per share on last year’s net profit of NT$6.52 billion, or NT$21.75 per share.
TECHNOLOGY
Foxconn shares climb
Foxconn Technology Co (鴻準) shares rose 3.23 percent to NT$112 yesterday, buoyed in part by Fubon Securities Co’s (富邦證券) comment that the Hon Hai Group (鴻海集團) unit would likely get more than half of the metal casing orders for the next-generation iPhone 6. The additional metal casing orders would contribute about 10 percent to Foxconn’s sales next year, Fubon said in a research note. The brokerage revised up its share price target for Foxconn to NT$150 from NT$115. Apple plans to launch a handset said to be called the iPhone 6C, a larger version of the iPhone 5S with a 4-inch retina display, in the first half of next year, Fubon said.
TELECOMS
Ericsson, Chunghwa ink deal
Ericsson AB yesterday announced a long-term evolution (LTE) expansion contract with Chunghwa Telecom Co (中華電信), which aims to further boost the Taiwanese firm’s 4G LTE coverage and capacity, according to a press release. The Swedish telecom manufacturer said its latest mobile broadband technology would help Chunghwa address the capacity needed to deliver more music, video and value-added business services. “The rapid growth of 4G subscriptions has exceeded our expectations. We see a huge data demand, and shifting consumer behavior to more data-centric services,” Chunghwa’s mobile business group president Lin Kuo-feng (林國豐) said in the release.
Napoleon Osorio is proud of being the first taxi driver to have accepted payment in bitcoin in the first country in the world to make the cryptocurrency legal tender: El Salvador. He credits Salvadoran President Nayib Bukele’s decision to bank on bitcoin three years ago with changing his life. “Before I was unemployed... And now I have my own business,” said the 39-year-old businessman, who uses an app to charge for rides in bitcoin and now runs his own car rental company. Three years ago the leader of the Central American nation took a huge gamble when he put bitcoin
Demand for artificial intelligence (AI) chips should spur growth for the semiconductor industry over the next few years, the CEO of a major supplier to Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) said, dismissing concerns that investors had misjudged the pace and extent of spending on AI. While the global chip market has grown about 8 percent annually over the past 20 years, AI semiconductors should grow at a much higher rate going forward, Scientech Corp (辛耘) chief executive officer Hsu Ming-chi (許明琪) told Bloomberg Television. “This booming of the AI industry has just begun,” Hsu said. “For the most prominent
PARTNERSHIPS: TSMC said it has been working with multiple memorychip makers for more than two years to provide a full spectrum of solutions to address AI demand Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) yesterday said it has been collaborating with multiple memorychip makers in high-bandwidth memory (HBM) used in artificial intelligence (AI) applications for more than two years, refuting South Korean media report's about an unprecedented partnership with Samsung Electronics Co. As Samsung is competing with TSMC for a bigger foundry business, any cooperation between the two technology heavyweights would catch the eyes of investors and experts in the semiconductor industry. “We have been working with memory partners, including Micron, Samsung Memory and SK Hynix, on HBM solutions for more than two years, aiming to advance 3D integrated circuit
Former Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) chairman Mark Liu (劉德音) yesterday warned against the tendency to label stakeholders as either “pro-China” or “pro-US,” calling such rigid thinking a “trap” that could impede policy discussions. Liu, an adviser to the Cabinet’s Economic Development Committee, made the comments in his keynote speech at the committee’s first advisers’ meeting. Speaking in front of Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰), National Development Council (NDC) Minister Paul Liu (劉鏡清) and other officials, Liu urged the public to be wary of falling into the “trap” of categorizing people involved in discussions into either the “pro-China” or “pro-US” camp. Liu,
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