Effective today, domestic gasoline and diesel prices will go down by NT$2 per liter and NT$2.2 per liter respectively, state-owned CPC Corp, Taiwan (CPC, 台灣中油) said yesterday.
The price drop is the first since Sept. 2 last year, when CPC lowered its gasoline and diesel prices by NT$0.6 per liter and NT$0.7 per liter respectively.
After the latest adjustment, CPC’s wholesale price for 92-octane unleaded gasoline is NT$33.4 per liter, NT$34.1 for 95-octane unleaded gasoline, NT$35.6 for 98-octane unleaded gasoline and NT$31.3 for diesel.
Under the new oil price mechanism, the price adjustments were determined by comparing the average oil price between Aug. 1 and Aug. 7 with the average oil price in June, which was US$129.2 per barrel, with exchange rate fluctuations factored in.
Under the government policy, the drop in prices was larger than CPC would have implemented. CPC said for example that the price of 92-octane unleaded gasoline should only be lowered by NT$0.2 per liter this week. But the NT$2 per liter drop factors in the NT$1.3 per liter absorbed by CPC since May 28 and the NT$0.5 per liter absorbed since Aug. 2.
CPC saw a loss of NT$50 billion as of the end of last month.
Following CPC’s announcement, Formosa Petrochemical Corp (FPC, 台塑石化), the nation’s only privately owned oil refiner, said last night it would drop its domestic gasoline and diesel prices by NT$2 per liter and NT$1.6 per liter respectively, effective midnight tonight.
Both CPC and FPC’s announcements of price cuts came after consumer prices surged 5.92 percent year-on-year last month, the highest level in nearly 14 years, the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) said on Tuesday.
In response to inflation driven primarily by rising food and fuel costs, Yum! Restaurants (Taiwan) Co (台灣百勝肯德雞), which operated the fast food chain Kentucky Fried Chicken (KFC) in Taiwan, said it would raise prices by as much as 10 percent beginning yesterday.
The company said in its statement on Thursday that the prices of chicken, eggs, cooking oil, dairy products, plastics and paper had surged between 20 percent and 50 percent, making a price hike necessary.
Last week, McDonald’s Corp said it would increase prices by an average of 20 percent beginning this month to reflect higher food and power costs.
When an apartment comes up for rent in Germany’s big cities, hundreds of prospective tenants often queue down the street to view it, but the acute shortage of affordable housing is getting scant attention ahead of today’s snap general election. “Housing is one of the main problems for people, but nobody talks about it, nobody takes it seriously,” said Andreas Ibel, president of Build Europe, an association representing housing developers. Migration and the sluggish economy top the list of voters’ concerns, but analysts say housing policy fails to break through as returns on investment take time to register, making the
NOT TO WORRY: Some people are concerned funds might continue moving out of the country, but the central bank said financial account outflows are not unusual in Taiwan Taiwan’s outbound investments hit a new high last year due to investments made by contract chipmaker Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) and other major manufacturers to boost global expansion, the central bank said on Thursday. The net increase in outbound investments last year reached a record US$21.05 billion, while the net increase in outbound investments by Taiwanese residents reached a record US$31.98 billion, central bank data showed. Chen Fei-wen (陳斐紋), deputy director of the central bank’s Department of Economic Research, said the increase was largely due to TSMC’s efforts to expand production in the US and Japan. Investments by Vanguard International
WARNING SHOT: The US president has threatened to impose 25 percent tariffs on all imported vehicles, and similar or higher duties on pharmaceuticals and semiconductors US President Donald Trump on Wednesday suggested that a trade deal with China was “possible” — a key target in the US leader’s tariffs policy. The US in 2020 had already agreed to “a great trade deal with China” and a new deal was “possible,” Trump said. Trump said he expected Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) to visit the US, without giving a timeline for his trip. Trump also said that he was talking to China about TikTok, as the US seeks to broker a sale of the popular app owned by Chinese firm ByteDance Ltd (字節跳動). Trump last week said that he had
STRUGGLING TO SURVIVE: The group is proposing a consortium of investors, with Tesla as the largest backer, and possibly a minority investment by Hon Hai Precision Nissan Motor Co shares jumped after the Financial Times reported that a high-level Japanese group has drawn up plans to seek investment from Elon Musk’s Tesla Inc to aid the struggling automaker. The group believes the electric vehicle (EV) maker is interested in acquiring Nissan’s plants in the US, the newspaper reported, citing people it did not identify. The proposal envisions a consortium of investors, with Tesla as the largest backer, but also includes the possibility of a minority investment by Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) to prevent a full takeover by the Apple supplier, the report said. The group is
RSS