PHARMACEUTICALS
Cancer drug approved
Drug developer PharmaEngine Inc (智擎) on Tuesday said that the European Commission has notified its licensing partner Shire PLC that sales permission for the new pancreatic cancer drug, Onivyde, in combination with 5-Fluorouracil and Leucovorin, has been approved. PharmaEngine is entitled to receive a milestone payment of US$25 million, which is estimated to contribute NT$6.49 (US$0.21) to its earnings per share. For the whole of this year, PharmaEngine is forecast to recognize major milestone payments totaling US$66.5 million, Capital Securities Corp (群益證券) said in a client note yesterday. With Onivyde hitting the European market soon, PharmaEngine is expected to receive sales royalties in proportion to the quarterly sales of the drug, along with three milestone payments totaling US$130 million over the next three years, Yuanta Securities Corp (元大證券) said in a separate note.
INTERNET
PChome Thai unit approved
Online shopping portal PChome Online Inc (網路家庭) yesterday said its Thailand unit has gained the approval of the Electronic Transactions Commission to conduct electronic payment services in the kingdom. The company said PChome Thailand Co Ltd, a joint venture with Cal-Comm Electronics and Communication Co (泰金寶), which is a unit of Taiwanese electronics conglomerate New Kinpo Group (新金寶集團), is to become the first Taiwanese e-commerce company to provide a variety of services in the kingdom.
AUTO PARTS
Tong Yang’s profits surge
Tong Yang Industry Co (東陽實業), which supplies automotive metal sheets and bumpers to global brands, reported a pre-tax profit of NT$254 million last month, up 25.25 percent from the previous month, as shipments continued to increase after the end of Chinese automakers’ summer break. As China’s new car sales continue to rise, Tong Yang’s original equipment manufacturing business there is expected to maintain consistent growth, with its plant in Foshan, Guangdong Province, already generating profits. However, the company’s plant in Xiangyang, Hubei Province, is still operating at a loss and is not expected to break even before the end of the year, the company said.
COMPONENTS
Jih Sun upbeat on TXC
Quartz crystal components maker TXC Corp (台灣晶技) might see its revenue increase 5 percent from last quarter’s NT$2.6 billion, setting a record-high for the company, thanks to clients’ increasing demand for sensor products and temperature compensated crystal oscillators, Jih Sun Securities Investment Consulting Co (日盛投顧) said in client note yesterday. The company’s gross margin could grow to 25.7 percent in the third quarter, with net profit up 24.9 percent quarterly to NT$260 million, Jih Sun said. The company, which designs, manufactures and sells frequency-control crystal components, is forecast to report net profit of NT$1 billion for whole of this year, with earnings per share of NT$3.24, the brokerage said.
RATINGS
Fitch upgrades utilities
Fitch Ratings Ltd on Tuesday upgraded its credit ratings on the nation’s state-run refiner CPC Corp, Taiwan (CPC, 中油) and state-owned utility Taiwan Power Co (Taipower, 台電). In a press release, the ratings agency said it has moved up its long-term foreign and local currency issuer default ratings to “AA-” from “A+” for both CPC and Taipower. Their national long-term ratings have been affirmed at “AAA(twn),” and the outlooks for their credit ratings are stable, Fitch said.
The New Taiwan dollar is on the verge of overtaking the yuan as Asia’s best carry-trade target given its lower risk of interest-rate and currency volatility. A strategy of borrowing the New Taiwan dollar to invest in higher-yielding alternatives has generated the second-highest return over the past month among Asian currencies behind the yuan, based on the Sharpe ratio that measures risk-adjusted relative returns. The New Taiwan dollar may soon replace its Chinese peer as the region’s favored carry trade tool, analysts say, citing Beijing’s efforts to support the yuan that can create wild swings in borrowing costs. In contrast,
Nvidia Corp’s demand for advanced packaging from Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) remains strong though the kind of technology it needs is changing, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) said yesterday, after he was asked whether the company was cutting orders. Nvidia’s most advanced artificial intelligence (AI) chip, Blackwell, consists of multiple chips glued together using a complex chip-on-wafer-on-substrate (CoWoS) advanced packaging technology offered by TSMC, Nvidia’s main contract chipmaker. “As we move into Blackwell, we will use largely CoWoS-L. Of course, we’re still manufacturing Hopper, and Hopper will use CowoS-S. We will also transition the CoWoS-S capacity to CoWos-L,” Huang said
Nvidia Corp CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) is expected to miss the inauguration of US president-elect Donald Trump on Monday, bucking a trend among high-profile US technology leaders. Huang is visiting East Asia this week, as he typically does around the time of the Lunar New Year, a person familiar with the situation said. He has never previously attended a US presidential inauguration, said the person, who asked not to be identified, because the plans have not been announced. That makes Nvidia an exception among the most valuable technology companies, most of which are sending cofounders or CEOs to the event. That includes
INDUSTRY LEADER: TSMC aims to continue outperforming the industry’s growth and makes 2025 another strong growth year, chairman and CEO C.C. Wei says Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), a major chip supplier to Nvidia Corp and Apple Inc, yesterday said it aims to grow revenue by about 25 percent this year, driven by robust demand for artificial intelligence (AI) chips. That means TSMC would continue to outpace the foundry industry’s 10 percent annual growth this year based on the chipmaker’s estimate. The chipmaker expects revenue from AI-related chips to double this year, extending a three-fold increase last year. The growth would quicken over the next five years at a compound annual growth rate of 45 percent, fueled by strong demand for the high-performance computing
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