Housing transactions in Taiwan might grow at a faster rate next quarter, despite a 30 percent increase so far this year, as many people think it is a good time to join the market, the results of a quarterly survey released yesterday by Evertrust Rehouse Co (永慶房屋) showed.
The nation’s largest broker by number of offices said it expects total transactions to reach 348,000 to 360,000 units this year, an annual gain of 13 to 17 percent from last year.
“The housing market is benefiting from an economic recovery, wealth effect fueled by TAIEX rallies and favorable lending terms for first-home purchases,” Evertrust general manager Yeh Ling-chi (葉凌棋) said.
Photo: CNA
The same factors also supported housing price increases of 10 to 15 percent over the past four quarters, Yeh said, citing real price transaction data jointly compiled by Evertrust and National Chengchi University.
The government in August introduced favorable lending terms such as ultra-low interest rates of 1.75 percent, a five-year grace period and mortgages of up to 40 years for first-home purchases despite a buyer’s age.
The stimulus program underpinned 40 percent of mortgage operations at the nation’s five major state-run banks: Bank of Taiwan (臺灣銀行), Land Bank of Taiwan (土地銀行), Taiwan Cooperative Bank (合作金庫銀行), Hua Nan Commercial Bank (華南銀行) and First Commercial Bank (第一銀行), government data showed.
Together, they drove 23 percent of overall deals, which would approximate 176,000 to 180,000 units in the first six months, indicating a 30 percent increase from a year earlier and muting a slowdown induced by credit controls, interest rate hikes, stiffer property taxes and bans of presale house purchase agreements, Evertrust said.
The property fever is posed to extend through the second half of this year, as 50 percent of the survey respondents said they believe it would be a good time to buy a house in the next 12 months, while 52 percent said it is the right time to sell, Evertrust research manager Daniel Chen (陳賜傑) said.
At the same time, 60 percent said they expect home prices to rise next quarter, way higher than the 9 percent who said they expect price corrections, Chen said.
In addition, 53 percent said they would hasten purchase decisions to take advantage of the stimulus program, he said.
A massive earthquake measuring 7.2 on the Richter scale that struck in Hualien on April 3 would not dampen buying interest, although nearly 90 percent said they prefer to buy homes that are less than 20 years old, he said.
Buying interest was strongest in Kaohsiung at 64 percent, followed by Hsinchu County at 57 percent, Taichung at 56 percent, Taoyuan and New Taipei City at 53 percent each, and Taipei at 52 percent, the survey showed.
Leading Taiwanese bicycle brands Giant Manufacturing Co (巨大機械) and Merida Industry Co (美利達工業) on Sunday said that they have adopted measures to mitigate the impact of the tariff policies of US President Donald Trump’s administration. The US announced at the beginning of this month that it would impose a 20 percent tariff on imported goods made in Taiwan, effective on Thursday last week. The tariff would be added to other pre-existing most-favored-nation duties and industry-specific trade remedy levy, which would bring the overall tariff on Taiwan-made bicycles to between 25.5 percent and 31 percent. However, Giant did not seem too perturbed by the
AI SERVER DEMAND: ‘Overall industry demand continues to outpace supply and we are expanding capacity to meet it,’ the company’s chief executive officer said Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) yesterday reported that net profit last quarter rose 27 percent from the same quarter last year on the back of demand for cloud services and high-performance computing products. Net profit surged to NT$44.36 billion (US$1.48 billion) from NT$35.04 billion a year earlier. On a quarterly basis, net profit grew 5 percent from NT$42.1 billion. Earnings per share expanded to NT$3.19 from NT$2.53 a year earlier and NT$3.03 in the first quarter. However, a sharp appreciation of the New Taiwan dollar since early May has weighed on the company’s performance, Hon Hai chief financial officer David Huang (黃德才)
UNPRECEDENTED DEAL: The arrangement which also includes AMD risks invalidating the national security rationale for US export controls, an expert said Nvidia Corp and Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD) have agreed to pay 15 percent of their revenue from Chinese artificial intelligence (AI) chip sales to the US government in a deal to secure export licenses, an unusual arrangement that might unnerve both US companies and Beijing. Nvidia plans to share 15 percent of the revenue from sales of its H20 AI accelerator in China, a person familiar with the matter said. AMD is to deliver the same share from MI308 revenue, the person added, asking for anonymity to discuss internal deliberations. The arrangement reflects US President Donald Trump’s consistent effort to engineer
NVIDIA FACTOR: Shipments of AI servers powered by GB300 chips would undergo pilot runs this quarter, with small shipments possibly starting next quarter, it said Quanta Computer Inc (廣達), which supplies artificial intelligence (AI) servers powered by Nvidia Corp chips, yesterday said that AI servers are on track to account for 70 percent of its total server revenue this year, thanks to improved yield rates and a better learning curve for Nvidia’s GB300 chip-based servers. AI servers accounted for more than 60 percent of its total server revenue in the first half of this year, Quanta chief financial officer Elton Yang (楊俊烈) told an online conference. The company’s latest production learning curve of the AI servers powered by Nvidia’s GB200 chips has improved after overcoming key component
RSS