CTCI Corp (中鼎工程) on Tuesday said it would continue to focus on markets abroad, as macroeconomic conditions improve.
The nation’s leading engineering, procurement and construction solutions provider for refineries and power plant facilities has revised its estimate for potential sales opportunities across the globe this year to NT$584.6 billion (US$18.03 billion), higher than the NT$570.6 it estimated at the end of the third quarter last year.
In the US market, CTCI hopes to capture opportunities from increasing investments by downstream petrochemical companies, as the cost of using US-produced shale gas as feedstock to produce ethylene is still lower than using naphtha imported from Asia, the company said.
CTCI said it also plans to tap into Russia and Kazakhstan’s abundant oil and gas resources with Chinese partners, and continue to seek participation in India’s steel mill and municipal solid waste incineration projects as well as the Indian government’s “Made in India” initiative.
Last year, the company’s net income rose 1.3 percent annually to NT$2.57 billion, while revenue rose 16.2 percent to NT$67.06 billion. Contributions from new contracts were tallied at NT$65.5 billion last year, down 17.21 percent from 2014 and lower than NT$6.69 billion in 2013.
While Taiwan is still the company’s largest revenue source at 56 percent of total sales last year, CTCI said that 69 percent of new contracts signed last year were from the Middle East, followed by 18 percent in Taiwan and 6 percent in Malaysia, with China representing 4 percent.
As an example, the company last year signed its largest contract with US-based Chicago Bridge & Iron Co to jointly build a petrochemical and plastics complex in Oman worth US$2.8 billion.
CTCI is expected to take half the windfall for the contract and receive preliminary design-phase payments this year, with the bulk of the payments expected between next year and 2018, the company said.
The company on Tuesday also announced that it is to distribute NT$2.4 in dividends, representing 89 percent of its NT$2.69 earnings per share (EPS) for last year.
Jih Sun Securities Investment Consulting Co (日盛投顧) analyst Chiang Chao-peng (江釗亨) yesterday forecast that CTCI’s sales this year would increase 10.36 percent annually to NT$74 billion.
However, he revised downward his net income forecast to NT$2.32 billion and slashed his EPS forecast to NT$3.05 from NT$3.56, due to a forecast increase in bad-debt provisions in the first half of this year correlating to the anticipated rise in sales.
CHIP WAR: Tariffs on Taiwanese chips would prompt companies to move their factories, but not necessarily to the US, unleashing a ‘global cross-sector tariff war’ US President Donald Trump would “shoot himself in the foot” if he follows through on his recent pledge to impose higher tariffs on Taiwanese and other foreign semiconductors entering the US, analysts said. Trump’s plans to raise tariffs on chips manufactured in Taiwan to as high as 100 percent would backfire, macroeconomist Henry Wu (吳嘉隆) said. He would “shoot himself in the foot,” Wu said on Saturday, as such economic measures would lead Taiwanese chip suppliers to pass on additional costs to their US clients and consumers, and ultimately cause another wave of inflation. Trump has claimed that Taiwan took up to
SUPPORT: The government said it would help firms deal with supply disruptions, after Trump signed orders imposing tariffs of 25 percent on imports from Canada and Mexico The government pledged to help companies with operations in Mexico, such as iPhone assembler Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), also known as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團), shift production lines and investment if needed to deal with higher US tariffs. The Ministry of Economic Affairs yesterday announced measures to help local firms cope with the US tariff increases on Canada, Mexico, China and other potential areas. The ministry said that it would establish an investment and trade service center in the US to help Taiwanese firms assess the investment environment in different US states, plan supply chain relocation strategies and
WASHINGTON POLICY: Tariffs of 10 percent or more and other new costs are tipped to hit shipments of small parcels, cutting export growth by 1.3 percentage points The decision by US President Donald Trump to ban Chinese companies from using a US tariff loophole would hit tens of billions of dollars of trade and reduce China’s economic growth this year, according to new estimates by economists at Nomura Holdings Inc. According to Nomura’s estimates, last year companies such as Shein (希音) and PDD Holdings Inc’s (拼多多控股) Temu shipped US$46 billion of small parcels to the US to take advantage of the rule that allows items with a declared value under US$800 to enter the US tariff-free. Tariffs of 10 percent or more and other new costs would slash such
Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) is reportedly making another pass at Nissan Motor Co, as the Japanese automaker's tie-up with Honda Motor Co falls apart. Nissan shares rose as much as 6 percent after Taiwan’s Central News Agency reported that Hon Hai chairman Young Liu (劉揚偉) instructed former Nissan executive Jun Seki to connect with French carmaker Renault SA, which holds about 36 percent of Nissan’s stock. Hon Hai, the Taiwanese iPhone-maker also known as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團), was exploring an investment or buyout of Nissan last year, but backed off in December after the Japanese carmaker penned a deal