Benq Corp (明電), Taiwan's largest mobile-phone maker, may seek to raise up to NT$7.4 billion (US$212 million) in an overseas share sale, joining a growing number of companies betting that rising stock prices mean investors are keen to buy new stock.
Benq will ask its shareholders at a May 24 meeting to approve a plan to sell as many as 100 million shares, said spokesman Alex Liou. The sale would be worth NT$7.4 billion based on the stock's closing price of NT$74 today.
"It's using the opportunity of an economy on the mend and rising share price to raise more money," said Edward Su, who helps manage NT$4.2 billion in stocks, including Benq, at Barits Securities Investment Trust Co (倍利投信). Overseas sales give companies an edge in investing in China. Taiwan currently restricts companies from using funds raised on the island to invest in plants or companies in China. Last year, the government said it would increase the portion of funds publicly traded companies may invest in China from capital raised overseas.
"Investment is more convenient if we raise money overseas," Liou said.
Taiwan's electronics companies are reviving fund-raising plans to finance expansion as a rebounding US economy lifts expectations that demand for computers and mobile phones will rise. That, in turn, has boosted share prices. Benq's shares more than tripled in value since touching a 52-week low on Oct. 18.
The company didn't disclose where it might seek to sell. Yesterday, Macronix International Co (旺宏電子), Taiwan's largest maker of memory chips for consumer electronics, said it would sell shares overseas, raising as much as NT$24.5 billion to fund a new chip plant. An sale planned last year foundered after the company's shares slipped almost two-thirds as chip demand and prices tumbled.
In February, Nanya Technology Corp (南亞科技), whose shares have risen almost sixfold since Oct. 8, received regulatory approval to raise as much as US$600 million in the second quarter to build a new plant.
Benq, which made 6.8 million handsets in 2001, will use the proceeds from its sale for "overseas procurement and to reduce exchange rate risks," according to a company statement.
Benq plans to boost production at a plant in China this year to half of total production from less than a third in 2001. The company, formerly known as Acer Communications & Multimedia Inc, plans to produce 1.5 million flat-panel displays on the mainland.
Last year, it made almost all its 1.2 million displays in Taiwan.
Benq, which makes mobile phones for Motorola Inc, also expects to make two-fifths of its handsets this year in China, after the Taiwan government scrapped certain restrictions on mainland investment, Liou said. In January, said it expects to make a third of its phones in China.
Benq shares were unchanged at NT$74.
Taiwan’s Lee Chia-hao (李佳豪) on Sunday won a silver medal at the All England Open Badminton Championships in Birmingham, England, a career best. Lee, 25, took silver in the final of the men’s singles against world No. 1 Shi Yuqi (石宇奇) of China, who won 21-17, 21-19 in a tough match that lasted 51 minutes. After the match, the Taiwanese player, who ranks No. 22 in the world, said it felt unreal to be challenging an opponent of Shi’s caliber. “I had to be in peak form, and constantly switch my rhythm and tactics in order to score points effectively,” he said. Lee got
EMBRACING TAIWAN: US lawmakers have introduced an act aiming to replace the use of ‘Chinese Taipei’ with ‘Taiwan’ across all Washington’s federal agencies A group of US House of Representatives lawmakers has introduced legislation to replace the term “Chinese Taipei” with “Taiwan” across all federal agencies. US Representative Byron Donalds announced the introduction of the “America supports Taiwan act,” which would mandate federal agencies adopt “Taiwan” in place of “Chinese Taipei,” a news release on his page on the US House of Representatives’ Web site said. US representatives Mike Collins, Barry Moore and Tom Tiffany are cosponsors of the legislation, US political newspaper The Hill reported yesterday. “The legislation is a push to normalize the position of Taiwan as an autonomous country, although the official US
CHANGE OF TONE: G7 foreign ministers dropped past reassurances that there is no change in the position of the G7 members on Taiwan, including ‘one China’ policies G7 foreign ministers on Friday took a tough stance on China, stepping up their language on Taiwan and omitting some conciliatory references from past statements, including to “one China” policies. A statement by ministers meeting in Canada mirrored last month’s Japan-US statement in condemning “coercion” toward Taiwan. Compared with a G7 foreign ministers’ statement in November last year, the statement added members’ concerns over China’s nuclear buildup, although it omitted references to their concerns about Beijing’s human rights abuses in Xinjiang, Tibet and Hong Kong. Also missing were references stressing the desire for “constructive and stable relations with China” and
‘CROWN JEWEL’: Washington ‘can delay and deter’ Chinese President Xi Jinping’s plans for Taiwan, but it is ‘a very delicate situation there,’ the secretary of state said US President Donald Trump is opposed to any change to Taiwan’s “status quo” by force or extortion and would maintain that policy, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio told the Hugh Hewitt Show host on Wednesday. The US’ policy is to maintain Taiwan’s “status quo” and to oppose any changes in the situation by force or extortion, Rubio said. Hewitt asked Rubio about the significance of Trump earlier this month speaking with Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (台積電) chairman C.C. Wei (魏哲家) at the White House, a meeting that Hewitt described as a “big deal.” Asked whether the meeting was an indication of the
RSS