AIRLINES
CAL sells, leases five jets
China Airlines Ltd (CAL, 中華航空) yesterday said it sold five Airbus SE A330-300 jets to Irish leasing company Altitude Aircraft Cal I Ltd for between US$30 million and US$33 million each and immediately leased them back to maintain its capacity. CAL reported a loss of about NT$90 million (US$2.9 million) from the transaction, as the disposal gain of US$156 million was less than the five jets’ asset value of NT$4.942 billion. CAL said the number of its passenger airplanes remains at 70.
SOLAR INDUSTRY
TSE raises NT$455 million
TSE Corp (元晶), which makes solar modules and helps clients install solar panels, has raised NT$455 million via a rights issue, it said in a filing with the Taiwan Stock Exchange yesterday. The company plans to use the proceeds to repay bank loans. Shareholders subscribed to the newly issued 65 million common shares at NT$7 per share, the filing said. The price represented a 12.5 percent discount to the stock’s closing price of NT$8 in Taipei trading yesterday.
TECHNOLOGY
Asustek, institute sign deal
Asustek Computer Inc (華碩) yesterday signed a memorandum of understanding with the Chungshan Institute of Science and Technology to collaborate on various digital applications, such as cloud-based storage, an artificial intelligence (AI) development platform and Internet of Things technologies. Asustek last year worked with the National Applied Research Laboratories in the development of the supercomputer Taiwania. The company aims to expand the supercomputer’s AI and big data capabilities by the end of this year.
MACROECONOMICS
Wages post stable growth
The average regular wage rose 2.42 percent from a year earlier to NT$41,927 in July after a 2.33 percent year-on-year increase in June, the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics reported on Wednesday. The average earned income, which includes regular salary plus bonuses, overtime pay and other irregular income, also rose 2.53 percent to NT$53,017, the agency said. In the first seven months of the year, the average regular wage climbed 2.32 percent to NT$41,702, while the average earned income grew 1.81 percent to NT$56,360, it said.
ENERGY
Orsted to sell green bonds
Danish energy developer Orsted A/S on Wednesday said that it is planning to issue New Taiwan dollar-denominated green bonds on the local market by the end of the year. The company said in a statement that it is in talks with a consortium — led by BNP Paribas SA and Deutsche Bank AG — that includes CTBC Bank (中國信託銀行) and Bank of Taiwan (臺灣銀行) to underwrite the sale. It did not disclose the financial terms for the planned issue. Funds raised from the bond sale would be injected into Taiwan’s offshore wind power industry, Orsted said.
AUTOMOTIVE
Iron Force sales rise 9.14%
Iron Force Industrial Co (劍麟), which supplies seat belts, airbag inflators and safety parts, on Tuesday reported that cumulative revenue in the first eight months of the year increased 9.14 percent to NT$3.06 billion due to rising shipments of automotive safety system parts, led by precision tubes for pretensioner seat belts. The company said in a news release that order visibility and factory utilization rates have improved this year, as major vehicle brands increase adoption of safety parts.
British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak’s government should take steps to cut UK reliance on semiconductors from Taiwan because of the threat posed by China, a draft strategy said. Chinese interference or an invasion of Taiwan would threaten Britain’s economy, according to the unpublished strategy seen by Bloomberg. That is because it would compromise supplies to and from Taiwan, which is home to more than 90 percent of the manufacturing capacity for all leading-edge chips, including the world’s pre-eminent silicon foundry, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (台積電). The strategy is important because semiconductors are used in everything from cellphones to cars, and shortages have
BIG SPENDERS: China’s reopening is a key ‘mega-theme’ for the sector, RBC Bank said, but it remains to be seen how much Chinese tourists will buy The European luxury sector is welcoming the end of pandemic lockdowns in China, as the return of big-spending Chinese tourists could sustain further growth. Prior to the pandemic, Chinese tourists visiting Europe were a major source of sales for luxury houses. The Chinese accounted for “a third of luxury purchases in the world and two-thirds of those purchases were made outside China”, said Joelle de Montgolfier, head of the luxury division at management consulting firm Bain & Co. Their return has led RBC Bank to revise up its growth forecast for the sector this year to 11 percent, from 7 percent previously. “China
‘IT HURTS TOO MUCH’: After talks between Blizzard and NetEase over their contract broke down, servers hosting Blizzard’s games in China were shut down Millions of Chinese gamers have lost access to World of Warcraft after a furious dispute between US title owner Activision Blizzard Inc and NetEase Inc (網易), its longtime local partner in the world’s biggest gaming market. Devotees of the popular game took to social media networks to bemoan the loss, with one posting an image of a failed connection message accompanied by crying emojis. “It really hurts my heart,” one wrote. “It hurts, it hurts too much,” another said. Massively popular worldwide, particularly in the 2000s, World of Warcraft — often abbreviated as WoW — is an online multiplayer role-playing game set in
The US Department of Justice (DOJ) on Tuesday accused Alphabet Inc’s Google of abusing its dominance in digital advertising, threatening to dismantle a key business at the heart of one of Silicon Valley’s most successful Internet firms. The US government said Google should be forced to sell its ad manager suite, tackling a business that generated about 12 percent of Google’s revenues in 2021, but also plays a vital role in the search engine and cloud company’s overall sales. “Google has used anticompetitive, exclusionary, and unlawful means to eliminate or severely diminish any threat to its dominance over digital advertising technologies,” the
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