The New Taiwan dollar yesterday strengthened past NT$30 against the greenback for the first time in 18 months.
The local currency rose as much as 0.6 percent to NT$29.965 per US dollar and closed at NT$30.106 in Taipei trading, with turnover of US$833 million during the trading session.
Largely as a result of strong demand from Taiwanese exporters at the end of the year, the local currency moved above NT$30 against the greenback in the morning session and that strength continued, dealers said.
However, US dollar buying re-emerged in the afternoon trading session, in particular in the latter part of the session, helping the US currency recover most of its earlier losses by the end of the day, dealers said.
They suspect the buying largely came from the central bank, which is seeking to slow down the pace of the NT dollar’s appreciation and maintain the nation’s competitive edge.
The NT dollar climbed about 3.4 percent in the second half of last year as the best performer among the world’s major currencies.
Local financial markets are shut today for the New Year holiday.
The NT dollar has been boosted by the most foreign equity inflows in Asia this year after India.
Overseas investors have been heartened by Taiwan’s success retaking some of the global technology supply chain amid trade tensions between the US and China.
“The [New] Taiwan dollar has clearly been an outperformer in the second half,” Credit Agricole CIB emerging markets strategist Eddie Cheung (張敬勤) said. “We think it’s driven by the market realization that it is emerging as a US-China trade war winner. The growth turnaround has been rapid and Taiwan seems to be gaining an early edge in the turn of the tech cycle.”
Traders have speculated that the central bank has been stepping into the market to slow the currency’s advance.
Central bank Governor Yang Chin-long (楊金龍) last month said that the monetary authority would “smooth” the market when large inflows cause excessive volatility. Policymakers likely want to curb more gains by the NT dollar to protect exporters.
The benchmark TAIEX gained 23.33 percent last year, its best showing since 2009.
A humming economy would keep adding momentum to local financial markets, and the presidential and legislative elections on Saturday next week would not slow that momentum, analysts said.
Additional reporting by CNA
CHIP RACE: Three years of overbroad export controls drove foreign competitors to pursue their own AI chips, and ‘cost US taxpayers billions of dollars,’ Nvidia said China has figured out the US strategy for allowing it to buy Nvidia Corp’s H200s and is rejecting the artificial intelligence (AI) chip in favor of domestically developed semiconductors, White House AI adviser David Sacks said, citing news reports. US President Donald Trump on Monday said that he would allow shipments of Nvidia’s H200 chips to China, part of an administration effort backed by Sacks to challenge Chinese tech champions such as Huawei Technologies Co (華為) by bringing US competition to their home market. On Friday, Sacks signaled that he was uncertain about whether that approach would work. “They’re rejecting our chips,” Sacks
Taiwan’s exports soared 56 percent year-on-year to an all-time high of US$64.05 billion last month, propelled by surging global demand for artificial intelligence (AI), high-performance computing and cloud service infrastructure, the Ministry of Finance said yesterday. Department of Statistics Director-General Beatrice Tsai (蔡美娜) called the figure an unexpected upside surprise, citing a wave of technology orders from overseas customers alongside the usual year-end shopping season for technology products. Growth is likely to remain strong this month, she said, projecting a 40 percent to 45 percent expansion on an annual basis. The outperformance could prompt the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and
Two Chinese chipmakers are attracting strong retail investor demand, buoyed by industry peer Moore Threads Technology Co’s (摩爾線程) stellar debut. The retail portion of MetaX Integrated Circuits (Shanghai) Co’s (上海沐曦) upcoming initial public offering (IPO) was 2,986 times oversubscribed on Friday, according to a filing. Meanwhile, Beijing Onmicro Electronics Co (北京昂瑞微), which makes radio frequency chips, was 2,899 times oversubscribed on Friday, its filing showed. The bids coincided with Moore Threads’ trading debut, which surged 425 percent on Friday after raising 8 billion yuan (US$1.13 billion) on bets that the company could emerge as a viable local competitor to Nvidia
BARRIERS: Gudeng’s chairman said it was unlikely that the US could replicate Taiwan’s science parks in Arizona, given its strict immigration policies and cultural differences Gudeng Precision Industrial Co (家登), which supplies wafer pods to the world’s major semiconductor firms, yesterday said it is in no rush to set up production in the US due to high costs. The company supplies its customers through a warehouse in Arizona jointly operated by TSS Holdings Ltd (德鑫控股), a joint holding of Gudeng and 17 Taiwanese firms in the semiconductor supply chain, including specialty plastic compounds producer Nytex Composites Co (耐特) and automated material handling system supplier Symtek Automation Asia Co (迅得). While the company has long been exploring the feasibility of setting up production in the US to address
RSS