■SHIPPING
China opens ports to Taiwan
China approved five additional ports for direct shipping with Taiwan, bringing the total to 68, the state-run Xinhua news agency reported, citing China’s transportation ministry. The addition of ports Tongling, Shidao, Laizhou, Taizhou Damaiyu and Ningbo-Zhoushan were announced yesterday at a meeting on cross-strait direct shipping in the southern city of Xiamen, Xinhua said. China agreed to waive business taxes and corporate income taxes for Taiwanese shippers on profit earned in China from direct shipping, Xinhua said. The exemption is effective from Dec. 15 of last year, it said.
■STOCKS
China’s IPO backlog mounts
China, whose stock market is the world’s third-best performer this year, has 300 to 400 companies waiting to hold initial public offerings, Citic Securities Co (中信證券) chairman Wang Dongming (王東明) said. That backlog will take two years to clear, Wang, who heads China’s biggest brokerage by market value, said yesterday at a forum in Shanghai. China hasn’t had an IPO since September. The nation’s securities regulator plans to set up a new system for pricing initial public offerings and may “soon” end a moratorium on IPOs, China Securities Regulatory Commission Vice Chairman Fan Fuchun (范富春) said on March 6. Listings were halted “because the market needed a rest,” Fan said. “The decision on who to list, how to price the listing should be given to the investment bank, company and investors,” Wang said.
■STOCKS
Shanghai, Taipei in talks
The Shanghai Stock Exchange and the Taiwan Stock Exchange are in “detailed discussions” on cooperation, Shanghai bourse executive vice president James Liu (劉嘯東) said on Friday at a forum in the Chinese city. Implementation of the initiatives under discussion will depend on government approval, Liu said, without giving details. Taipei will host a conference on exchange-traded funds next week, Taiwan Stock Exchange Chairman Schive Chi (薛琦) said at the forum.
■REAL ESTATE
Report predicts HK rebound
Hong Kong home prices may rebound to levels seen in early September, before the global financial system imploded, according to a report yesterday by Centaline Property Agency Ltd (中原地產). “With sales transactions stabilizing at a normal level and investors preferring to buy fixed assets, we may see home prices back to those levels by year-end,” Wong Leung-sing (黃良昇), an associate director at Centaline, said in a phone interview. Four of the biggest mass housing estates Centaline tracks have already risen past prices posted in early September, the agency said.
■FINANCE
ADB criticizes Philippines
The Asian Development Bank (ADB) said yesterday the Philippines has failed to follow a commitment to reduce the number of state-run corporations that have been bleeding government coffers dry. It said Manila sought ADB technical assistance in 2006 to improve the efficiency of government-owned or government-controlled corporations that perform socially oriented services such as maintaining food supply stability or provide basic services in areas including transport, housing and utilities. State enterprises have been “problematic” with “weak institutional and regulatory frameworks” and “most” have been bleeding red ink, the Manila-based ADB said.
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) founder Morris Chang (張忠謀) yesterday said that Intel Corp would find itself in the same predicament as it did four years ago if its board does not come up with a core business strategy. Chang made the remarks in response to reporters’ questions about the ailing US chipmaker, once an archrival of TSMC, during a news conference in Taipei for the launch of the second volume of his autobiography. Intel unexpectedly announced the immediate retirement of former chief executive officer Pat Gelsinger last week, ending his nearly four-year tenure and ending his attempts to revive the
WORLD DOMINATION: TSMC’s lead over second-placed Samsung has grown as the latter faces increased Chinese competition and the end of clients’ product life cycles Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) retained the No. 1 title in the global pure-play wafer foundry business in the third quarter of this year, seeing its market share growing to 64.9 percent to leave South Korea’s Samsung Electronics Co, the No. 2 supplier, further behind, Taipei-based TrendForce Corp (集邦科技) said in a report. TSMC posted US$23.53 billion in sales in the July-September period, up 13.0 percent from a quarter earlier, which boosted its market share to 64.9 percent, up from 62.3 percent in the second quarter, the report issued on Monday last week showed. TSMC benefited from the debut of flagship
A former ASML Holding NV employee is facing a lawsuit in the Netherlands over suspected theft of trade secrets, Dutch public broadcaster NOS said, in the latest breach of the maker of advanced chip-manufacturing equipment. The 43-year-old Russian engineer, who is suspected of stealing documents such as microchip manuals from ASML, is expected to appear at a court in Rotterdam today, NOS reported on Friday. He is accused of multiple violations of the sanctions legislation and has been given a 20-year entry ban by the Dutch government, the report said. The Dutch company makes machines needed to produce high-end chips that power
As South Korea descends into political chaos, its equity market risks falling further behind major tech rival Taiwan, which is basking in the glory of a global artificial intelligence (AI) boom. A near-30 percent surge in Taiwan’s stock benchmark this year, set to be the best since 2009, has already helped spur a historic divergence between Asia’s two tech-dominated markets. The nation’s market capitalization now exceeds South Korea’s by about US$950 billion as the world’s AI frontrunners from Nvidia Corp and Microsoft Corp to OpenAI all increasingly turn to Taiwanese firms for supply. Looking ahead to next year, while both export-oriented economies
RSS