Yang Ming Marine Transport Corp (陽明海運) is not considering conducting a capital reduction in the short term, but might evaluate the possibility of retiring some stock repurchased from the market, company chairman Cheng Cheng-mount (鄭貞茂) told an annual shareholders’ conference in Keelung yesterday.
Cheng’s comment came after several minor shareholders suggested that Yang Ming Marine Transport should reduce its capital and return cash to shareholders, following the example of its local peer Evergreen Marine Corp (長榮海運).
The shareholders also complained about Yang Ming Marine Transport’s low payout ratio. The company proposed paying a cash dividend of NT$20 per share, a payout ratio of just 41 percent, lower than those of its local peers, despite it having cash and cash equivalents totaling more than NT$100 billion (US$3.41 billion).
Photo courtesy of Yang Ming Marine Transport Corp
State-owned companies such as China Steel Corp (中鋼) delivered a payout ratio of 77 percent, a shareholder said.
Yang Ming Marine Transport is not considering such an approach to boost shareholders’ returns during his tenure as chairman, but it would mull retiring some stocks, Cheng said.
Retiring bonds is usually considered a better approach to help prop up a company’s share price than buying back shares, as it reduces the chances of earnings dilution, he said.
Although the company’s profit grew for a second consecutive year last year, the shipping industry is prone to volatility, Cheng said.
It is conservative about setting dividend payments, he said, adding that the company wants to conserve earnings and capital for the investments, such as buying new or second-hand ships.
Yang Ming Marine Transport would not pursue a higher market share, but a better gross margin, he added.
The company would not irrationally expand its fleet, as the costs of news vessels and containers have been rising, Cheng said.
Shareholders yesterday approved the company’s plan to distribute a cash dividend of NT$20 per share. It is the first time that it has issued a cash dividend in about 10 years.
Shareholders also approved a proposal to set aside NT$2 billion for employees’ compensation.
Each employee would receive an average of NT$1.16 million, corporate data showed.
Overall, market demand for shipping is expected to be higher than supply, pushing up the freight rates, but rising global inflation and the development of the COVID-19 pandemic has clouded the visibility of the outlook, the company said.
KEEPING UP: The acquisition of a cleanroom in Taiwan would enable Micron to increase production in a market where demand continues to outpace supply, a Micron official said Micron Technology Inc has signed a letter of intent to buy a fabrication site in Taiwan from Powerchip Semiconductor Manufacturing Corp (力積電) for US$1.8 billion to expand its production of memory chips. Micron would take control of the P5 site in Miaoli County’s Tongluo Township (銅鑼) and plans to ramp up DRAM production in phases after the transaction closes in the second quarter, the company said in a statement on Saturday. The acquisition includes an existing 12 inch fab cleanroom of 27,871m2 and would further position Micron to address growing global demand for memory solutions, the company said. Micron expects the transaction to
Nvidia Corp’s GB300 platform is expected to account for 70 to 80 percent of global artificial intelligence (AI) server rack shipments this year, while adoption of its next-generation Vera Rubin 200 platform is to gradually gain momentum after the third quarter of the year, TrendForce Corp (集邦科技) said. Servers based on Nvidia’s GB300 chips entered mass production last quarter and they are expected to become the mainstay models for Taiwanese server manufacturers this year, Trendforce analyst Frank Kung (龔明德) said in an interview. This year is expected to be a breakout year for AI servers based on a variety of chips, as
Global semiconductor stocks advanced yesterday, as comments by Nvidia Corp chief executive officer Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) at Davos, Switzerland, helped reinforce investor enthusiasm for artificial intelligence (AI). Samsung Electronics Co gained as much as 5 percent to an all-time high, helping drive South Korea’s benchmark KOSPI above 5,000 for the first time. That came after the Philadelphia Semiconductor Index rose more than 3 percent to a fresh record on Wednesday, with a boost from Nvidia. The gains came amid broad risk-on trade after US President Donald Trump withdrew his threat of tariffs on some European nations over backing for Greenland. Huang further
HSBC Bank Taiwan Ltd (匯豐台灣商銀) and the Taiwan High Prosecutors Office recently signed a memorandum of understanding (MOU) to enhance cooperation on the suspicious transaction analysis mechanism. This landmark agreement makes HSBC the first foreign bank in Taiwan to establish such a partnership with the High Prosecutors Office, underscoring its commitment to active anti-fraud initiatives, financial inclusion, and the “Treating Customers Fairly” principle. Through this deep public-private collaboration, both parties aim to co-create a secure financial ecosystem via early warning detection and precise fraud prevention technologies. At the signing ceremony, HSBC Taiwan CEO and head of banking Adam Chen (陳志堅)
RSS