The government’s business climate monitor returned to “green” as the nation’s export-reliant economy resumed a stable recovery after two months of slowdown, the National Development Council said yesterday.
The total score for the major economic bellwether stood at 24 last month, a 4-point gain from January, backed by improvements in industrial output, capital equipment imports and producers’ shipments, the council said.
“The latest figures suggest a healthy state for the nation’s economy, although the pace of growth remains modest,” council research director Wu Ming-huei (吳明蕙) told a media briefing.
The trade tensions between the US and China merit close attention and so do monetary policy moves by the US Federal Reserve and other central banks, Wu said.
The US and China account for about 50 percent of the nation’s exports.
The council uses a five-color spectrum to identify the nation’s economic state, with “blue” representing a recession, “green” signifying steady growth and “red” indicating overheating. Dual-color signals suggest the economy is changing gears.
CONFIDENCE
The leading indicator index, which is aimed at forecasting the economic landscape six months ahead, stood at 101.17, down 0.13 percentage points from one month earlier, the council said.
The indices on semiconductor equipment imports, building permits and employee payrolls posted positive cyclical movements, while export orders, monetary supply and stock prices had negative cyclical movements, it said.
The coincident indicators, which reflect the current economic state, printed 102.05, up 0.05 percentage points from one month earlier, it said.
The measures on producers shipments for manufacturing, industrial production and electrical equipment imports registered positive cyclical movements, while sales of trade and food services, exports, non-agricultural employment and power consumption saw negative cyclical movements, it said.
The nation’s economy might continue to find support in global economic expansion and new technology applications, Wu added.
Trade disputes between the US and China have yet to impact on consumer confidence as the measure increased to a 32-month high of 87.86 this month, a National Central University (NCU) survey showed yesterday.
The gauge on stock investment confidence picked up 5.3 points to 106.2, above the neutral threshold of 100, the monthly report said.
NCU Research Center for Taiwan Economic Development director Dachrahn Wu (吳大任) attributed the rosy sentiment to the timing of the survey, which was conducted from Monday to Thursday last week, before the world’s two largest economies announced protectionist measures.
The local bourse has come through sluggish transactions, judging from the daily turnover of NT$120 billion (US$4.12 billion) so far this year, compared with an average of NT$100 billion last year and NT$80 billion in 2016, NCU professor of economics Yau Ruey (姚睿) said.
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) would not produce its most advanced technologies in the US next year, Minister of Economic Affairs J.W. Kuo (郭智輝) said yesterday. Kuo made the comment during an appearance at the legislature, hours after the chipmaker announced that it would invest an additional US$100 billion to expand its manufacturing operations in the US. Asked by Taiwan People’s Party Legislator-at-large Chang Chi-kai (張啟楷) if TSMC would allow its most advanced technologies, the yet-to-be-released 2-nanometer and 1.6-nanometer processes, to go to the US in the near term, Kuo denied it. TSMC recently opened its first US factory, which produces 4-nanometer
PROTECTION: The investigation, which takes aim at exporters such as Canada, Germany and Brazil, came days after Trump unveiled tariff hikes on steel and aluminum products US President Donald Trump on Saturday ordered a probe into potential tariffs on lumber imports — a move threatening to stoke trade tensions — while also pushing for a domestic supply boost. Trump signed an executive order instructing US Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick to begin an investigation “to determine the effects on the national security of imports of timber, lumber and their derivative products.” The study might result in new tariffs being imposed, which would pile on top of existing levies. The investigation takes aim at exporters like Canada, Germany and Brazil, with White House officials earlier accusing these economies of
Teleperformance SE, the largest call-center operator in the world, is rolling out an artificial intelligence (AI) system that softens English-speaking Indian workers’ accents in real time in a move the company claims would make them more understandable. The technology, called accent translation, coupled with background noise cancelation, is being deployed in call centers in India, where workers provide customer support to some of Teleperformance’s international clients. The company provides outsourced customer support and content moderation to global companies including Apple Inc, ByteDance Ltd’s (字節跳動) TikTok and Samsung Electronics Co Ltd. “When you have an Indian agent on the line, sometimes it’s hard
PROBE CONTINUES: Those accused falsely represented that the chips would not be transferred to a person other than the authorized end users, court papers said Singapore charged three men with fraud in a case local media have linked to the movement of Nvidia’s advanced chips from the city-state to Chinese artificial intelligence (AI) firm DeepSeek (深度求索). The US is investigating if DeepSeek, the Chinese company whose AI model’s performance rocked the tech world in January, has been using US chips that are not allowed to be shipped to China, Reuters reported earlier. The Singapore case is part of a broader police investigation of 22 individuals and companies suspected of false representation, amid concerns that organized AI chip smuggling to China has been tracked out of nations such
RSS