MANAGEMENT
TFCC chair quitting
Minister of Finance Chang Sheng-ford (張盛和) yesterday confirmed that Taipei Financial Center Corp (TFCC, 台北金融大樓) chairwoman Christina Sung (宋文琪) had expressed her intention to leave her post as soon as Dec. 6 due to personal reasons. Chang said the government is looking for a suitable candidate to take over management of Taipei 101. Candidates must be skilled in foreign languages, public relations and management, he said, adding that such a candidate is hard to find.
ELECTRONICS
Yageo expects slowdown
Yageo Corp (國巨), the nation’s largest passive components manufacturer, yesterday said it expects demand this quarter to be affected by a seasonal slowdown. The company reported a 70 percent sequential increase in net income to NT$1.23 billion (US$37.7 million), or NT$1.86 per share, last quarter. Yageo attributed the rise to non-operating gains of NT$623 million — including an investment gain of NT$60 million, interest income of NT$53 million and foreign exchange gains of NT$218 million. Cumulative net income in the first three quarters of the year reached NT$2.89 billion, or earnings per share of NT$4.32, Yageo said.
Gaming
X-Legend back in black
Online game publisher X-Legend Entertainment Co (傳奇網路) yesterday said it swung into profit last quarter, bolstered by robust sales of new products and better operating expense control. Net income was NT$48 million last quarter, or earnings per share of NT$0.43, the company said. That compares with a net loss per share of NT$0.51 in the second quarter. In the first 10 months of the year, revenue totaled N$97.61 billion, down 17 percent year-on-year, the company said.
MANUFACTURING
St Shine makes forex gains
Contact lens supplier St Shine Optical Co (精華光學) on Tuesday reported a third-quarter profit of NT$471 million, up 41.7 percent year-on-year, due to better-than-expected foreign exchange gains of NT$130 million. Earnings per share were NT$9.35 last quarter, while gross margin recovered to 36.4 percent and operating margin increased to 27.5 percent on the back of a rising utilization rate and stronger order flow from Japan and Taiwan.Daiwa Capital Markets in a client note forecast that St Shine’s sales would grow 7.4 percent year-on-year this year, while net profit would drop 10.7 percent mainly due to a shrinking gross margin.
ELECTRONICS
HTC sales improve slightly
HTC Corp (宏達電) yesterday reported sales of NT$8.95 billion (US$274.62 million) for last month, down 43.2 percent from last year’s NT$15.75 billion, but up 26.05 percent from NT$7.1 billion in the prior month, the company said in a filing with the Taiwan Stock Exchange. HTC on Friday last week said its sales and earnings for this quarter would show incremental improvement from last quarter, thanks to the launch of its latest flagship model and an ongoing financial restructuring.
ELECTRONICS
Acer predicts subsidy boost
Acer Inc (宏碁) is optimistic that its smartphone sales in Taiwan would rise at least 25 percent to more than 100,000 units next year from this year’s 80,000, Acer Taiwan operations president Towny Huang (黃鐘鋒) said yesterday. The company’s smartphone business is expected to benefit from the government’s recent announcement of a subsidy for consumers upgrading from 2G phones to 4G smartphones. About 1 million people still use 2G phones in the nation, Huang said.
From India to China to the US, automakers cannot make vehicles — not that no one wants any, but because a more than US$450 billion industry for semiconductors got blindsided. How did both sides end up here? Over the past two weeks, automakers across the world have bemoaned the shortage of chips. Germany’s Audi, owned by Volkswagen AG, would delay making some of its high-end vehicles because of what chief executive officer Markus Duesmann called a “massive” shortfall in an interview with the Financial Times. The firm has furloughed more than 10,000 workers and reined in production. That is a further blow
Answering to a reported request by Germany to help address a chip shortage in its auto industry, the Ministry of Economic Affairs (MOEA) yesterday said that it was in talks with domestic chip suppliers. Foreign media over the weekend reported that German Minister of Economic Affairs Peter Altmaier had sent a request to Taipei to ask Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) to cooperate more closely with German automakers to provide microchips and sensors, to bridge a shortage that has emerged over the past few months. The MOEA said that it had not yet received the request and could therefore not elaborate
FOCUS ON FOUNDRIES: An analyst said that some investors would be disappointed because they were expecting a larger announcement of a partnership with TSMC Intel Corp’s incoming chief executive officer Pat Gelsinger on Thursday pledged to regain the company’s lead in chip manufacturing, countering growing calls from some investors to shed that part of its business. “I am confident that the majority of our 2023 products will be manufactured internally,” Gelsinger said. “At the same time, given the breadth of our portfolio, it’s likely that we will expand our use of external foundries for certain technologies and products.” He plans to provide more details after officially taking over the CEO role on Feb. 15, but Gelsinger was clear that Intel is sticking with its once mighty
AWARENESS NEEDED: The central bank urged lenders to know their customers before undertaking business for them and to seek funding in conventional ways The central bank yesterday said that it would take action against four foreign lenders for their involvement in helping companies trade in the deliverable forward market in contravention of foreign-exchange regulations. Some grain merchants newly based in Taiwan have since July 2019 been practicing questionable currency-trading activity, with the help of branches and subsidiaries of six foreign banks, the monetary policymaker told an unscheduled news conference. Affiliated firms as of July last year completed currency-related deals they referred to as trading that totaled US$11 billion, which was not in sync with their real business needs, the central bank said after wrapping up
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