BANKING
Mortgage rates remain low
The home mortgage rates of five major state-run banks last month fell 0.006 percentage points month-on-month to 1.361 percent, due to fierce competition among banks and beneficial rates offered to first-time home buyers, data released yesterday by the central bank showed. New home loans offered by Bank of Taiwan (臺灣銀行), First Commercial Bank (第一銀行), Hua Nan Commercial Bank (華南銀行), Land Bank of Taiwan (土地銀行) and Taiwan Cooperative Bank (合作金庫銀行) increased to NT$57.954 billion (US$2.03 million), up NT$6.71 billion from the previous month and the highest this year, the data showed. The average interest rate for new loans offered by the banks rose to 1.256 percent, up from 1.222 percent in October, which the central bank mainly attributed to increasing loan demand by firms wanting funds for working capital and capital expenditure.
MANUFACTURING
TSMC’s US plant approved
The Investment Commission on Tuesday approved Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co’s (TSMC, 台積電) planned chip plant in Arizona — the largest overseas investment by a Taiwanese company in nearly eight years. Early this month, the company set up TSMC Arizona Corp with US$30 million and applied for a capital increase of US$3.47 billion — a total investment of about US$3.5 billion for the planned 5-nanometer 12-inch chip plant, the commission said. TSMC is scheduled to start producing chips at the plant in the first half of 2024 to meet strong demand for advanced chips in the North American market, it said. TSMC had said that it expects the project to create about 1,900 jobs over five years.
TECHNOLOGY
iPhone tops local market
Apple Inc last month grabbed more than half of local smartphone sales, thanks to the launch of the iPhone 12 series, industry statistics released yesterday showed. Apple’s smartphone sales rose to 620,000 units, up from 567,000 units in October, giving Apple a 55.5 percent market share by sales volume, up from 37.8 percent in October, data showed. Trailing Apple in sales volume were Samsung Electronics Co at 15.6 percent, Oppo Mobile Telecommunications Corp (歐珀) at 7.5 percent, Vivo Communication Technology Co (維沃) at 5.6 percent and Realme Mobile Telecommunications (Shenzhen) Co (銳爾覓) at 5.1 percent, while HTC Corp (宏達電) came in sixth with a 2 percent market share, the data showed.
ELECTRONICS
Laptops spark local growth
Companies in the local electronics connector industry, such as Sinbon Electronics Co (信邦電子) and Lotes Co Ltd (嘉澤), are expected to benefit from buoyant demand for laptops in the first quarter of next year, with the shipment of Chromebooks used for health applications helping to avoid a low-season effect, SinoPac Securities Investment Service Corp (永豐投顧) said in a note last week. “Notebook computer shipments are likely to be better than expected, and momentum looks sustainable for the short term, based on our recent check of supply chains,” SinoPac said. “With Chromebooks spearheading the growth, shipment volume of Type C connectors, laptop board-to-board connectors and laptop flexible printed circuit connectors will remain strong,” it added. In addition, laptop assembly volume remains high, buoyed this quarter by shipments of Chromebooks to Dell Inc, HP Inc and Lenovo Group Inc (聯想), and next quarter by shipments to Asustek Computer Inc (華碩) and Acer Inc (宏碁), SinoPac said.
Taiwan’s rapidly aging population is fueling a sharp increase in homes occupied solely by elderly people, a trend that is reshaping the nation’s housing market and social fabric, real-estate brokers said yesterday. About 850,000 residences were occupied by elderly people in the first quarter, including 655,000 that housed only one resident, the Ministry of the Interior said. The figures have nearly doubled from a decade earlier, Great Home Realty Co (大家房屋) said, as people aged 65 and older now make up 20.8 percent of the population. “The so-called silver tsunami represents more than just a demographic shift — it could fundamentally redefine the
Businesses across the global semiconductor supply chain are bracing themselves for disruptions from an escalating trade war, after China imposed curbs on rare earth mineral exports and the US responded with additional tariffs and restrictions on software sales to the Asian nation. China’s restrictions, the most targeted move yet to limit supplies of rare earth materials, represent the first major attempt by Beijing to exercise long-arm jurisdiction over foreign companies to target the semiconductor industry, threatening to stall the chips powering the artificial intelligence (AI) boom. They prompted US President Donald Trump on Friday to announce that he would impose an additional
China Airlines Ltd (CAL, 中華航空) said it expects peak season effects in the fourth quarter to continue to boost demand for passenger flights and cargo services, after reporting its second-highest-ever September sales on Monday. The carrier said it posted NT$15.88 billion (US$517 million) in consolidated sales last month, trailing only September last year’s NT$16.01 billion. Last month, CAL generated NT$8.77 billion from its passenger flights and NT$5.37 billion from cargo services, it said. In the first nine months of this year, the carrier posted NT$154.93 billion in cumulative sales, up 2.62 percent from a year earlier, marking the second-highest level for the January-September
Asian e-commerce giant Shein’s (希音) decision to set up shop in a historic Parisian department store has ruffled feathers in the fashion capital. Anger has been boiling since Shein announced last week that it would open its first permanent physical store next month at BHV Marais, an iconic building that has stood across from Paris City Hall since 1856. The move prompted some French brands to announce they would leave BHV Marais, but the department store had already been losing tenants over late payments. Aime cosmetics line cofounder Mathilde Lacombe, whose brand was among those that decided to leave following
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