TAIEX down 0.32 percent
Taiwanese share prices closed 0.32 percent lower yesterday after an overnight fall on Wall Street and concerns over money-laundering allegations implicating former president Chen Shui-bian (陳水扁) and his family, dealers said.
The weighted index fell 22.14 points to 6,978.60, off a low of 6,849.83 and a high of 6,998.24, on turnover of NT$83.11 billion (US$2.66 billion).
Andrew Teng of Taiwan International Securities said shares were dented by weak US stocks and regional markets but came off an early low with suspected support from government funds.
“Today the stock market’s performance was better than expected [and] it is likely to [spur] investors’ confidence,” he said.
Analysts said that an ongoing probe into money-laundering allegations against Chen and his family continued to cast a shadow on the market.
Chunghwa shuffles heads
Chunghwa Telecom Co (中華電信), the nation’s largest telecom operator, will name company president Lu Shyue-ching (呂學錦) to replace Hochen Tan (賀陳旦) as new chairman in a special board meeting scheduled for today as the company’s biggest shareholder requested, the Chinese-language Economics Daily News reported yesterday.
The phone company’s biggest shareholder, the Ministry of Transportation and Communications, which holds 36 percent in Chunghwa Telecom, sent a written letter to the phone company on Monday requesting the shuffle, the report said.
As part of the management shake-up, Chang Shaio-tung (張曉東), a vice president of Chunghwa Telecom, will be promoted to company president, the report said.
HTC phone wins award
European Imaging and Sound Association (EISA) named High Tech Computer Corp’s (HTC, 宏達電) Touch Diamond the Best European Smart Phone of the year.
EISA said HTC won the award because its phone combines multiple functions with a slick design. In terms of performance and available functions, connoisseurs and novices alike could not ask for any better.
HTC Touch Diamond runs on Windows Mobile V6.1 and is enhanced with a new 3D TouchFlo interview.
Meanwhile, EISA’s European music phone award went to Sony Ericsson’s W980i, while Samsung’s SGH-G810 took away the European photo phone trophy.
Taiwan at Tokyo Gift Show
A Taiwanese delegation will take part in the 66th Tokyo International Gift Show from Sept. 2 through Sept. 5 at the Tokyo International Exhibition Center.
The delegation will be headed by Lin Jeng-yi (林正儀), director of the National Taiwan Craft Research Institute in Nantou County’s Tsaotun Township (草屯).
Lin told a press conference on Monday that the Taiwan pavilion would have seven booths in which three categories of gifts will be displayed: fashion gifts, environmentally friendly gifts and technology gifts.
Lin said that in addition to displaying a variety of Taiwan-made gifts, the Taiwan pavilion would invite Taiwanese craftsmen to demonstrate the techniques used in making glass corsages.
The Tokyo International Gift Show, established in 1976, is held twice a year, in the spring and in the fall. It is one of the largest international gift trade fairs in the world.
Some 2,400 companies from around the world will occupy 4,200 booths st the show, which is expected to attract 200,000 visitors.
NT drops against greenback
The New Taiwan dollar dropped NT$0.082 to NT$31.389 against the US dollar yesterday on turnover of US$990 million.
The New Taiwan dollar is on the verge of overtaking the yuan as Asia’s best carry-trade target given its lower risk of interest-rate and currency volatility. A strategy of borrowing the New Taiwan dollar to invest in higher-yielding alternatives has generated the second-highest return over the past month among Asian currencies behind the yuan, based on the Sharpe ratio that measures risk-adjusted relative returns. The New Taiwan dollar may soon replace its Chinese peer as the region’s favored carry trade tool, analysts say, citing Beijing’s efforts to support the yuan that can create wild swings in borrowing costs. In contrast,
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Nvidia Corp CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) is expected to miss the inauguration of US president-elect Donald Trump on Monday, bucking a trend among high-profile US technology leaders. Huang is visiting East Asia this week, as he typically does around the time of the Lunar New Year, a person familiar with the situation said. He has never previously attended a US presidential inauguration, said the person, who asked not to be identified, because the plans have not been announced. That makes Nvidia an exception among the most valuable technology companies, most of which are sending cofounders or CEOs to the event. That includes
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