AUTO PARTS
Hota reports profit drop
Hota Industrial Manufacturing Co (和大工業), which makes gears and shafts for vehicles, yesterday reported net profit of NT$255.7 million (US$8.5 million) in the first quarter, down 1.54 percent annually from NT$259.4 million a year earlier. Earnings per share dropped to NT$1.08, from NT$1.1 a year earlier, according to a company filing with the Taiwan Stock Exchange. The company attributed the worse-than-expected financial performance to volatile foreign-exchange rates, which reduced profit by NT$113 million over the period due to a strong New Taiwan dollar against the US dollar.
BANKING
Samsung Pay tests begin
Seven domestic banks yesterday announced that they have begun testing Samsung Pay in a bid to prepare for the official launch of Samsung Electronics Co’s payment service before the end of the month after gaining regulatory approval in November last year. The service is available on high-end Samsung devices that have been released in the past year. For merchants, the service is compatible with older payment terminals that only support magnetic strip cards, the South Korean company said. The banks also announced promotional deals to attract subscribers.
CURRENCY
NT rises against greenback
The New Taiwan dollar yesterday rose against the US dollar, gaining NT$0.156 to close at NT$30.062, with further foreign-fund inflows motivating local traders to cut their holdings in the US currency, dealers said. A strong showing in the local equity market, on the back of aggressive foreign institutional buying and the strength of other currencies in the region increased downward pressure on the US dollar, which fell below the NT$30 mark against the New Taiwan dollar at one point, they said. Fund inflows into the Asia-Pacific region lifted other regional currencies, in particular the South Korean won, which the NT dollar tracks closely, dealers said.
E-COMMERCE
JD.com eyes PT Tokopedia
JD.com Inc (京東商城), Alibaba Group Holding Ltd’s (阿里巴巴) fiercest rival in Chinese e-commerce, is in talks to make a major investment in Indonesia’s PT Tokopedia to speed its expansion into Southeast Asia’s largest economy, people familiar with the matter said. JD.com is in early-stage negotiations to invest hundreds of millions of US dollars in one of Indonesia’s largest online marketplaces, one of the people said, asking not to be identified because the deal is private. JD.com’s potential investment could propel Jakarta-based Tokopedia past a valuation of US$1 billion, another person familiar with the deal said.
TELECOMS
Softbank linked to One97
Softbank Group Corp is in talks to invest about US$1.4 billion in India’s One97 Communications Ltd in a deal that would value the owner of India’s largest digital-payments provider at about US$7 billion, people familiar with the matter said. The deal is not yet finalized and the terms might change, the people said, asking not to be identified because the matter is private. One97 Communications, whose Paytm unit has seen business surge as India took most of its paper bills from circulation, has also had discussions with two other investors, one of the people said. The company was last valued at US$4.2 billion, according to research firm CB Insights.
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
A start-up in Mexico is trying to help get a handle on one coastal city’s plastic waste problem by converting it into gasoline, diesel and other fuels. With less than 10 percent of the world’s plastics being recycled, Petgas’ idea is that rather than letting discarded plastic become waste, it can become productive again as fuel. Petgas developed a machine in the port city of Boca del Rio that uses pyrolysis, a thermodynamic process that heats plastics in the absence of oxygen, breaking it down to produce gasoline, diesel, kerosene, paraffin and coke. Petgas chief technology officer Carlos Parraguirre Diaz said that in
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
Japan intends to closely monitor the impact on its currency of US President Donald Trump’s new tariffs and is worried about the international fallout from the trade imposts, Japanese Minister of Finance Katsunobu Kato said. “We need to carefully see how the exchange rate and other factors will be affected and what form US monetary policy will take in the future,” Kato said yesterday in an interview with Fuji Television. Japan is very concerned about how the tariffs might impact the global economy, he added. Kato spoke as nations and firms brace for potential repercussions after Trump unleashed the first salvo of