BANKING
Yuan deposits decline
Yuan deposits held by local banks fell 2.17 percent to 301.792 billion yuan (US$43.75 billion) at the end of last month, the central bank said yesterday. That marked the second straight month of decline after deposits fell 2.23 percent to 308.48 billion yuan the previous month, as well as the lowest in four years, as the Chinese currency continued to weaken against the greenback amid concern over increasing US-China trade tensions. Yuan deposits at domestic banking units fell 1.93 percent to 267.521 billion yuan last month and those at offshore units fell 3.95 percent to 34.271 billion yuan, the central bank said.
STEELMAKERS
CSC’s profit slumps
China Steel Corp (CSC, 中鋼), Taiwan’s only integrated steelmaker, yesterday posted a pretax profit of NT$2.78 billion (US$90 million) for last month, down 3.88 percent from NT$2.89 billion a year earlier and 22.12 percent lower than the previous month’s NT$3.57 billion, due to falling prices and shipments. Consolidated sales were NT$34.53 billion, down 5.23 percent year-on-year, but up 16.89 percent month-on-month, the Kaohsiung-based company’s data showed. In the first 11 months of the year, pretax profit totaled NT$29.94 billion, up 49.7 percent from NT$20 billion in the same period last year, the company said.
CIRCUIT BOARDS
Flexium capex approved
Flexium Interconnect Inc (台郡), a Kaohsiung-based supplier of flexible printed circuit boards, yesterday said its board of directors had approved an NT$8 billion capital expenditure (capex) budget to meet a customer’s demand. Flexium said in a Taiwan Stock Exchange filing that the budget is to be used mainly to build new production capacity, adding that the company would adjust the budget subject to customer demand and the market situation. The company did not identify the customer in the filing, although it is one of the key suppliers for Apple Inc’s iPhones.
SEMICONDUCTORS
Win to end GDR program
Win Semiconductors Corp (穩懋), the world’s largest pure-play gallium arsenide foundry, yesterday said its board of directors had resolved to terminate the firm’s global depositary receipt (GDR) program to cut management costs. As of Saturday, the firm had no outstanding GDRs on the Luxembourg Stock Exchange, Win Semiconductors said in a regulatory filing. In the first three quarters of the year, the company reported cumulative sales of NT$13.1 billion and net income of NT$2.36 billion, or earnings per share of NT$5.59.
SHIPPERS
Wan Hai to buy containers
Container shipper Wan Hai Lines Ltd (萬海航運) yesterday said its board of auditors had agreed to purchase 32,000 twenty-foot-equivalent unit (TEU) dry containers to develop its business. The US$57.13 million deal is to be reviewed by the company’s board of directors. The announcement comes after the company last month announced that it was ordering 20 full-container vessels from Chinese and Japanese shipbuilders, reflecting the company’s positive outlook for the industry. On Nov. 12, Wan Hai said it would order 12 full-container vessels with 2,038 TEU from China Shipbuilding Trading Co (中國船舶工業貿易) and Guangzhou Wenchong Shipyard Co (廣州文沖船廠) for US$315.94 million, as well as another eight full-container vessels with 3,036 TEU from Japan Marine United Corp for ￥37.68 billion (US$332.7 million).
Taiwan’s foreign exchange reserves hit a record high at the end of last month, surpassing the US$600 billion mark for the first time, the central bank said yesterday. Last month, the country’s foreign exchange reserves rose US$5.51 billion from a month earlier to reach US$602.94 billion due to an increase in returns from the central bank’s portfolio management, the movement of other foreign currencies in the portfolio against the US dollar and the bank’s efforts to smooth the volatility of the New Taiwan dollar. Department of Foreign Exchange Director-General Eugene Tsai (蔡炯民)said a rate cut cycle launched by the US Federal Reserve
Handset camera lens maker Largan Precision Co (大立光) on Sunday reported a 6.71 percent year-on-year decline in revenue for the third quarter, despite revenue last month hitting the highest level in 11 months. Third-quarter revenue was NT$17.68 billion (US$581.2 million), compared with NT$18.95 billion a year earlier, the company said in a statement. The figure was in line with Yuanta Securities Investment Consulting Co’s (元大投顧) forecast of NT$17.9 billion, but missed the market consensus estimate of NT$18.97 billion. The third-quarter revenue was a 51.44 percent increase from NT$11.67 billion in the second quarter, as the quarter is usually the peak
Nvidia Corp’s major server production partner Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) reported 10.99 percent year-on-year growth in quarterly sales, signaling healthy demand for artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure. Revenue totaled NT$2.06 trillion (US$67.72 billion) in the last quarter, in line with analysts’ projections, a company statement said. On a quarterly basis, revenue was up 14.47 percent. Hon Hai’s businesses cover four primary product segments: cloud and networking, smart consumer electronics, computing, and components and other products. Last quarter, “cloud and networking products delivered strong growth, components and other products demonstrated significant growth, while smart consumer electronics and computing products slightly declined,” compared with the
The US government on Wednesday sanctioned more than two dozen companies in China, Turkey and the United Arab Emirates, including offshoots of a US chip firm, accusing the businesses of providing illicit support to Iran’s military or proxies. The US Department of Commerce included two subsidiaries of US-based chip distributor Arrow Electronics Inc (艾睿電子) on its so-called entity list published on the federal register for facilitating purchases by Iran’s proxies of US tech. Arrow spokesman John Hourigan said that the subsidiaries have been operating in full compliance with US export control regulations and his company is discussing with the US Bureau of
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