International paper prices are likely to continue increasing through the first quarter of this year, paper maker YFY Inc (永豐餘控股) said yesterday.
As the price of wastepaper, the most crucial material for paper makers to generate pulp, soared 30 percent year-on-year to US$225 per tonne in the US last year, a YFY official said the company plans to increase its prices this quarter.
YFY manufactures a wide range of paper products, such as pulp, household-use paper and industrial paper.
The official said YFY would take its customers’ feedback into account when adjusting product prices. She declined to elaborate.
Chinese paper makers last year raised prices of industrial paper products by 33 percent on average, she added.
Last month, Cheng Loong Corp (正隆紙業), the nation’s biggest industrial paper maker, announced it would increase prices by between 12 and 15 percent, or about NT$1,500 (US$46.9) per tonne, this year to reflect rising raw material and transportation costs.
Long Chen Paper Co (榮成紙業) is also considering raising its prices.
“We will follow market mechanisms and the [new] product prices will be in line with global trends,” Long Chen spokesman Tsou Yung-fang (鄒永芳) said by telephone, adding that wastepaper makes up nearly 60 percent of product costs.
Apart from price increases, the nation’s major paper makers also plan to continue expanding their capacity.
YFY is to set up new production lines at its paper plant in Taoyuan, which has an annual capacity of 698,000 tonnes of industrial paper products.
Cheng Loong is constructing a new plant in Vietnam which is scheduled to begin operations next year in a bid to develop a complete supply chain in Southeast Asia. The new factory is to have an installed capacity of 300,000 tonnes per year.
Long Chen’s new plant in China’s Hubei Province is to begin operations in the third quarter with an annual capacity of 850,000 tonnes.
Shares of YFY surged by 9.92 percent to NT$10.75, while those of Cheng Loong gained 9.7 percent to NT$14.7 and Long Chen rose 5.73 percent to NT$18.45.
SEEKING CLARITY: Washington should not adopt measures that create uncertainties for ‘existing semiconductor investments,’ TSMC said referring to its US$165 billion in the US Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) told the US that any future tariffs on Taiwanese semiconductors could reduce demand for chips and derail its pledge to increase its investment in Arizona. “New import restrictions could jeopardize current US leadership in the competitive technology industry and create uncertainties for many committed semiconductor capital projects in the US, including TSMC Arizona’s significant investment plan in Phoenix,” the chipmaker wrote in a letter to the US Department of Commerce. TSMC issued the warning in response to a solicitation for comments by the department on a possible tariff on semiconductor imports by US President Donald Trump’s
The government has launched a three-pronged strategy to attract local and international talent, aiming to position Taiwan as a new global hub following Nvidia Corp’s announcement that it has chosen Taipei as the site of its Taiwan headquarters. Nvidia cofounder and CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) on Monday last week announced during his keynote speech at the Computex trade show in Taipei that the Nvidia Constellation, the company’s planned Taiwan headquarters, would be located in the Beitou-Shilin Technology Park (北投士林科技園區) in Taipei. Huang’s decision to establish a base in Taiwan is “primarily due to Taiwan’s talent pool and its strength in the semiconductor
An earnings report from semiconductor giant and artificial intelligence (AI) bellwether Nvidia Corp takes center stage for Wall Street this week, as stocks hit a speed bump of worries over US federal deficits driving up Treasury yields. US equities pulled back last week after a torrid rally, as investors turned their attention to tax and spending legislation poised to swell the US government’s US$36 trillion in debt. Long-dated US Treasury yields rose amid the fiscal worries, with the 30-year yield topping 5 percent and hitting its highest level since late 2023. Stocks were dealt another blow on Friday when US President Donald
UNCERTAINTY: Investors remain worried that trade negotiations with Washington could go poorly, given Trump’s inconsistency on tariffs in his second term, experts said The consumer confidence index this month fell for a ninth consecutive month to its lowest level in 13 months, as global trade uncertainties and tariff risks cloud Taiwan’s economic outlook, a survey released yesterday by National Central University found. The biggest decline came from the timing for stock investments, which plunged 11.82 points to 26.82, underscoring bleak investor confidence, it said. “Although the TAIEX reclaimed the 21,000-point mark after the US and China agreed to bury the hatchet for 90 days, investors remain worried that the situation would turn sour later,” said Dachrahn Wu (吳大任), director of the university’s Research Center for
RSS