Taiwanese exports last month surged to an all-time high, buoyed by robust global demand for artificial intelligence (AI) technologies, early stocking of next-generation mobile devices and accelerated shipments ahead of potential US tariff changes, the Ministry of Finance said yesterday.
Outbound shipments rose 23.5 percent year-on-year to US$53.32 billion, marking the 20th straight month of expansion, led by advanced tech components and high-end servers used in AI applications, Department of Statistics Director-General Beatrice Tsai (蔡美娜) told a news conference in Taipei.
“The performance can only be described as red-hot, bucking the usual seasonal lull,” Tsai said.
Photo: CNA
The strong momentum is expected to extend into this month, with export growth projected at 15 to 20 percent based on recent imports of key electronic components intended for exports, she said.
Technology products remained the dominant force, with electronics and information and communications technology (ICT) goods accounting for more than 72 percent of total exports.
Orders for high-performance chips and AI servers soared, fueled by a global surge in data center investment, Tsai said.
The US overtook China as Taiwan’s largest export destination last month for a second straight month, as American tech giants — Amazon.com Inc, Microsoft Corp and Google parent Alphabet Inc — ramped up spending on AI infrastructure, she said.
The shift also reflects ongoing realignment in the global tech supply chain, as Taiwanese firms comply with US restrictions on advanced tech exports to China, she said.
While tech exports powered ahead, traditional industries continued to lag. Textiles, plastics, chemicals and transport equipment all posted year-on-year declines, pointing to persistent weakness in broader global demand and excess supply in some sectors, Tsai said.
Meanwhile, imports last month rose 17.3 percent to US$41.26 billion, driven largely by surging purchases of capital equipment, the ministry said.
Semiconductor firms led the way, with spending on production tools soaring 90.4 percent from a year earlier.
The resulting trade surplus widened 157 percent to US$12.07 billion, evidence that Taiwan needs to try harder to appease Washington in tackling trade imbalances. The AI boom has been a key driver of Taiwan’s strong trade performance.
Second-quarter exports jumped 34.1 percent — outpacing government forecasts by nearly 7 percentage points — indicating upside risk to GDP growth projections, the ministry said.
For the first half of the year, exports rose 25.9 percent to US$283.26 billion, while imports climbed 20.5 percent to US$227.56 billion.
Among Asia’s key exporters, Taiwan posted the fastest year-on-year growth, outperforming China, South Korea, Japan and Singapore.
Still, the ministry warned of potential headwinds in the second half, citing lingering uncertainties over US tariffs, global interest rate policies, and possible weakness in consumer electronics demand.
CHIP RACE: Three years of overbroad export controls drove foreign competitors to pursue their own AI chips, and ‘cost US taxpayers billions of dollars,’ Nvidia said China has figured out the US strategy for allowing it to buy Nvidia Corp’s H200s and is rejecting the artificial intelligence (AI) chip in favor of domestically developed semiconductors, White House AI adviser David Sacks said, citing news reports. US President Donald Trump on Monday said that he would allow shipments of Nvidia’s H200 chips to China, part of an administration effort backed by Sacks to challenge Chinese tech champions such as Huawei Technologies Co (華為) by bringing US competition to their home market. On Friday, Sacks signaled that he was uncertain about whether that approach would work. “They’re rejecting our chips,” Sacks
NATIONAL SECURITY: Intel’s testing of ACM tools despite US government control ‘highlights egregious gaps in US technology protection policies,’ a former official said Chipmaker Intel Corp has tested chipmaking tools this year from a toolmaker with deep roots in China and two overseas units that were targeted by US sanctions, according to two sources with direct knowledge of the matter. Intel, which fended off calls for its CEO’s resignation from US President Donald Trump in August over his alleged ties to China, got the tools from ACM Research Inc, a Fremont, California-based producer of chipmaking equipment. Two of ACM’s units, based in Shanghai and South Korea, were among a number of firms barred last year from receiving US technology over claims they have
It is challenging to build infrastructure in much of Europe. Constrained budgets and polarized politics tend to undermine long-term projects, forcing officials to react to emergencies rather than plan for the future. Not in Austria. Today, the country is to officially open its Koralmbahn tunnel, the 5.9 billion euro (US$6.9 billion) centerpiece of a groundbreaking new railway that will eventually run from Poland’s Baltic coast to the Adriatic Sea, transforming travel within Austria and positioning the Alpine nation at the forefront of logistics in Europe. “It is Austria’s biggest socio-economic experiment in over a century,” said Eric Kirschner, an economist at Graz-based Joanneum
BUBBLE? Only a handful of companies are seeing rapid revenue growth and higher valuations, and it is not enough to call the AI trend a transformation, an analyst said Artificial intelligence (AI) is entering a more challenging phase next year as companies move beyond experimentation and begin demanding clear financial returns from a technology that has delivered big gains to only a small group of early adopters, PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC) Taiwan said yesterday. Most organizations have been able to justify AI investments through cost recovery or modest efficiency gains, but few have achieved meaningful revenue growth or long-term competitive advantage, the consultancy said in its 2026 AI Business Predictions report. This growing performance gap is forcing executives to reconsider how AI is deployed across their organizations, it said. “Many companies
RSS