People in Bangkok’s Chinatown area yesterday browse vegetarian food offered for sale ahead of the Thailand Vegetarian Festival, which begins on Sunday and runs until Oct. 4. Thailand’s economy is continuing to recover and is projected to grow by 2.8 percent this year.
Photo: EPA-EFE
FAIT ACCOMPLI? Dealers said that the central bank appeared reluctant to shore up the NT dollar because it was unlikely it could reverse the tide amid fund outflows The US dollar yesterday continued its upward momentum against the New Taiwan dollar, hitting a more than three-year high against the local currency on expectations that the US Federal Reserve would continue to aggressively raise interest rates. The US dollar closed up NT$0.163 at NT$31.293, its highest since Sept. 4, 2019. The greenback attracted strong buying soon after the local foreign exchange market opened as investors rushed to pick up the currency, betting that the Fed would act aggressively in a policymaking meeting scheduled for Tuesday and Wednesday next week, dealers said. The weakness of other regional currencies, including the yen, which fell
BULLISH: Although the central bank has turned the nation’s currency into a winner against Asian peers, it is still down more than 4 percent against the US dollar this year The Singapore dollar this year has established itself as Asia’s most resilient currency against the US dollar, and some strategists are betting on more strength if price pressures force the nation’s central bank to tighten its exchange-rate policy again next month. Goldman Sachs Group Inc, Citigroup Inc and MUFG Bank Ltd are among banks that are bullish on the currency, underpinned by an expectation that the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS) could extend policy tightening at its October meeting to help rein in core inflation, which hit a 14-year high in July. The predictions come as almost every major currency retreats against
Inside the bowels of a Hong Kong industrial building, Eric Pun was among two dozen people crammed into a classroom learning to drill holes — acquiring a new set of skills before heading abroad. Savvy businesses have started offering crash courses in subjects such as home repair and hairdressing, capitalizing on a wave of people departing Hong Kong as China cracks down on dissent and strict COVID-19 pandemic rules upend the economy. For Pun, a 35-year-old nurse emigrating to Australia with his family, taking the home repair class was both a practical cost-saving measure and a way to prepare mentally for the
HIGH-TECH CONCERNS: Trade ministry data showed that shipments of DRAM last month fell 24.7 percent from a year earlier, compared with a 7 percent July drop South Korea’s exports of its most lucrative memory chip fell by the most since 2019, indicating a deepening slump in technology demand central to global economic growth. Shipments of DRAM fell 24.7 percent from a year earlier last month, compared with a 7 percent decline in the previous month, data released yesterday by the South Korean Ministry of Trade, Industry and Energy showed. DRAM accounts for almost half of South Korean exports of memory chips. It works with processors and other types of semiconductors to store and process information in a wide range of electronics. Samsung Electronics Co and SK Hynix Inc, both