EQUITIES
Margin maintenance cut
The Financial Supervisory Commission yesterday announced that the minimum margin maintenance ratio would be cut to 90 percent from 120 percent, reversing an adjustment implemented on Aug. 13. The change is aimed at restoring market mechanisms to the local bourse as global markets had began stabilizing, the commission said. The move came after the commission on Sept. 21 lifted a ban on short selling that took effect on Aug. 24. Separately, the commission announced that insurance regulators would meet their Chinese counterparts for the third time on Thursday next week in Nantou County to further collaborative ties in regulatory efforts.
REAL ESTATE
Shinkong auction fails
The auction of the Shinkong Manhattan World Trade Building in Taipei’s Xinyi District (信義) yesterday fell through after it failed to draw any tender offers, bidding organizer Jones Lang LaSalle Taiwan (JLL, 仲量聯行) said by telephone. JLL Taiwan managing director Tony Chao (趙正義) attributed the failed bid to weak sentiment and political uncertainty. The office building near Taipei 101 had an asking price of NT$9 billion (US$277.29 million) and belongs to Shin Kong Life Insurance Co (新光人壽).
BANKING
Yuan deposits decline
Yuan deposits at local banks fell 2.26 percent to 322.33 billion yuan (US$51.29 billion) last month from August, as investors turned cautious about the currency, the central bank said yesterday. The third consecutive month of decline came as China pushes for the yuan’s inclusion in the IMF’s reserve currency basket, making it more receptive to its volatility, the central bank said. Yuan deposits at Taiwan’s domestic banking units totaled 273.49 billion yuan, while offshore banking units had 47.68 billion yuan, down 1.3 percent and 4.23 percent respectively from August levels. Some pundits have voiced concern that the reserve currency status may deal a blow to offshore yuan markets.
TRADE
Cross-strait talks in Taipei
The next round of negotiations on a cross-strait trade in goods agreement is to take place in Taipei next month, Minister of Economic Affairs John Deng (鄧振中) said yesterday. “The Ministry of Economic Affairs’ goal is to complete negotiations of the pact before the end of this year,” he told a media briefing. Deng said the agreement would play an important role in Taiwan’s bid to join the next round of negotiations of the US-led Trans-Pacific Partnership. “If we inked the [trade in goods] pact, Taiwan would have a better trade environment to join TPP,” he said. Bureau of Foreign Trade Director-General Yang Jen-ni (楊珍妮) will lead Taiwan’s team in the next round of trade negotiations.
SOLAR
Giga Solar sees 30% growth
Giga Solar Materials Corp (碩禾), a photovoltaic conductive paste maker, expects revenue to increase by up to 30 percent next year from this year, as the solar power market gains steam in China and the US, chairman Jimmy Chen (陳繼明) said yesterday, adding that order visibility has extended into the third quarter of next year. Revenue for this year is expected to grow by more than 50 percent from last year, he said. The company’s cumulative revenue expanded 62.9 percent year-on-year to NT$10.87 billion in the first three quarters of the year.
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
TECH RACE: The Chinese firm showed off its new Mate XT hours after the latest iPhone launch, but its price tag and limited supply could be drawbacks China’s Huawei Technologies Co (華為) yesterday unveiled the world’s first tri-foldable phone, as it seeks to expand its lead in the world’s biggest smartphone market and steal the spotlight from Apple Inc hours after it debuted a new iPhone. The Chinese tech giant showed off its new Mate XT, which users can fold three ways like an accordion screen door, during a launch ceremony in Shenzhen. The Mate XT comes in red and black and has a 10.2-inch display screen. At 3.6mm thick, it is the world’s slimmest foldable smartphone, Huawei said. The company’s Web site showed that it has garnered more than
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
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