Taiwan Power Co (Taipower, 台電) yesterday announced a plan to issue NT$17.65 billion (US$623.6 million) of unsecured corporate bonds next month, as the state-run utility aims to raise funds to build new liquefied natural gas (LNG) generators at the Taichung Power Plant, a combined-cycle LNG generator project in Taoyuan’s Datan Power Plant, the 7th Transmission and Substation Project as well as other investments.
The debt would comprise NT$3.4 billion of five-year bonds with a yield of 0.45 percent, NT$10.55 billion of seven-year bonds with a yield of 0.55 percent and NT$3.7 billion of 10-year bonds with a yield of 0.62 percent, Taipower said in a statement.
The bond sale would be Taipower’s first this year and the utility would repay bondholders with a lump sum at maturity, it said.
Photo: Lin Jing-hua, Taipei Times
The power generation projects would increase the diversity and strength of Taiwan’s power supply, Taipower said.
The utility has recently completed an ultra-high-voltage transmission line between New Taipei City’s Banciao District (板橋) and Taoyuan’s Longtan District (龍潭), after 18 years of construction.
Inaugurated on Saturday, the transmission line, which spans 105 towers across 40km, is running at full capacity, Taipower said, adding that it would help stabilize the electricity supply in northern Taiwan.
To many, Tatu City on the outskirts of Nairobi looks like a success. The first city entirely built by a private company to be operational in east Africa, with about 25,000 people living and working there, it accounts for about two-thirds of all foreign investment in Kenya. Its low-tax status has attracted more than 100 businesses including Heineken, coffee brand Dormans, and the biggest call-center and cold-chain transport firms in the region. However, to some local politicians, Tatu City has looked more like a target for extortion. A parade of governors have demanded land worth millions of dollars in exchange
Hong Kong authorities ramped up sales of the local dollar as the greenback’s slide threatened the foreign-exchange peg. The Hong Kong Monetary Authority (HKMA) sold a record HK$60.5 billion (US$7.8 billion) of the city’s currency, according to an alert sent on its Bloomberg page yesterday in Asia, after it tested the upper end of its trading band. That added to the HK$56.1 billion of sales versus the greenback since Friday. The rapid intervention signals efforts from the city’s authorities to limit the local currency’s moves within its HK$7.75 to HK$7.85 per US dollar trading band. Heavy sales of the local dollar by
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co’s (TSMC, 台積電) revenue jumped 48 percent last month, underscoring how electronics firms scrambled to acquire essential components before global tariffs took effect. The main chipmaker for Apple Inc and Nvidia Corp reported monthly sales of NT$349.6 billion (US$11.6 billion). That compares with the average analysts’ estimate for a 38 percent rise in second-quarter revenue. US President Donald Trump’s trade war is prompting economists to retool GDP forecasts worldwide, casting doubt over the outlook for everything from iPhone demand to computing and datacenter construction. However, TSMC — a barometer for global tech spending given its central role in the
The Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC) yesterday met with some of the nation’s largest insurance companies as a skyrocketing New Taiwan dollar piles pressure on their hundreds of billions of dollars in US bond investments. The commission has asked some life insurance firms, among the biggest Asian holders of US debt, to discuss how the rapidly strengthening NT dollar has impacted their operations, people familiar with the matter said. The meeting took place as the NT dollar jumped as much as 5 percent yesterday, its biggest intraday gain in more than three decades. The local currency surged as exporters rushed to