Securities firms’ profits double
Securities companies saw their net profit more than double last month from July, in part because of Yuanta Securities Co’s (元大寶來證券) returns on an investment in a non-core business, the Taiwan Stock Exchange (TWSE) said on Saturday.
The increase in those investment returns offset the negative impact on securities firms’ bottom lines of a decline in daily turnover in the nation’s equity markets last month, when average daily turnover fell about 20.6 percent month-on-month to NT$92.2 billion (US$3.07 billion), the TWSE said.
According to the TWSE, the nation’s 79 securities firms posted a combined net profit of NT$6.66 billion last month, up 160.89 percent from a month earlier.
The exchange said 49 out of the 79 firms were profitable, while the remaining 30 incurred losses during the month.
In the first eight months of the year, the 79 securities firms posted a combined net profit of NT$26 billion, up 121 percent from a year earlier, the exchange said.
Quiznos to open 100 stores
Toasted submarine sandwich brand Quiznos is planning to open 100 stores in Taiwan within 10 years, aiming to gain a sizable share of the nation’s fast-food market.
The first three stores are set to be in the Taipei region, and a flagship store is expected to open in the first quarter of next year, according to a spokesman for the Denver-based chain.
Quiznos opened its first store in Taipei City’s Xinyi District (信義) this month. Taiwan is the 40th nation Quiznos has opened stores in.
Founded in 1981, Quiznos is the second-largest submarine sandwich shop chain in North America. It has more than 2,000 outlets in 40 countries.
Best Mall eyes 100,000 clients
Best Mall (Best嚴選購物網), an online shopping site that started operations in Taiwan on Saturday, said it would focus on offering high-quality food items and hopes to attract 100,000 members by the end of this year, despite Taiwan being in the grips of a food safety scandal.
The e-commerce platform plans to provide consumers with high-quality food products because it is supervised by a team of doctors, Best Mall founder Yang Chang-yao (楊昌堯) said.
Best Mall also offers health, beauty and 3C products, as well as clothing and antiques, Yang said.
HTC beats Samsung to No.1
HTC Corp (宏達電) edged out South Korea’s Samsung Electronics Co to return to being Taiwan’s largest smartphone manufacturer based on units sold in the second quarter of this year, according to data released by research house International Data Corp (IDC) on Friday.
HTC took first place because of sales of its flagship One M8 and mid-tier Desire 816, while Samsung continued to benefit from the popularity of its high-end Note series, the report said.
Meanwhile, Taiwanese PC vendor Asustek Computer Inc (華碩) surprisingly climbed to third place on the back of its low-cost ZenFone 5 model, surpassing Japan’s Sony Mobile Communications AB in fourth and China’s Xiaomi Corp (小米) in fifth, the report said.
Based on IDC’s results, a total of 2.2 million smartphones were shipped to distributors in Taiwan during the second quarter, making it the third consecutive quarter in which shipments surpassed 2 million units.
Taiwan and France to create IoT
Taiwan and France will work together to develop the Internet of Things (IoT) in a bid to explore business opportunities within the potentially massive industry, Vice Minister of Economic Affairs Shen Jong-chin (沈榮津) said on Friday.
Shen made the remarks in Paris as the government-funded Institute for Information Industry (III) signed a memorandum of understanding with Institute National de Recherche en Informatique et en Automatique (INRIA), or French Institute for Research in Computer Science and Automation, and Universite Pierre et Marie Curie for future cooperation in developing the IoT.
Shen added that beyond the cooperation on the IoT with France, Taiwan is seeking to work with European countries on 5G technology and telematics development.
Anna Bhobho, a 31-year-old housewife from rural Zimbabwe, was once a silent observer in her home, excluded from financial and family decisionmaking in the deeply patriarchal society. Today, she is a driver of change in her village, thanks to an electric tricycle she owns. In many parts of rural sub-Saharan Africa, women have long been excluded from mainstream economic activities such as operating public transportation. However, three-wheelers powered by green energy are reversing that trend, offering financial opportunities and a newfound sense of importance. “My husband now looks up to me to take care of a large chunk of expenses,
SECTOR LEADER: TSMC can increase capacity by as much as 20 percent or more in the advanced node part of the foundry market by 2030, an analyst said Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) is expected to lead its peers in the advanced 2-nanometer process technology, despite competition from Samsung Electronics Co and Intel Corp, TrendForce Corp analyst Joanne Chiao (喬安) said. TSMC’s sophisticated products and its large production scale are expected to allow the company to continue dominating the global 2-nanometer process market this year, Chiao said. The world’s largest contract chipmaker is scheduled to begin mass production of chips made on the 2-nanometer process in its Hsinchu fab in the second half of this year. It would also hold a ceremony on Monday next week to
State-run CPC Corp, Taiwan (CPC, 台灣中油) yesterday signed a letter of intent with Alaska Gasline Development Corp (AGDC), expressing an interest to buy liquefied natural gas (LNG) and invest in the latter’s Alaska LNG project, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said in a statement. Under the agreement, CPC is to participate in the project’s upstream gas investment to secure stable energy resources for Taiwan, the ministry said. The Alaska LNG project is jointly promoted by AGDC and major developer Glenfarne Group LLC, as Alaska plans to export up to 20 million tonnes of LNG annually from 2031. It involves constructing an 1,290km
NEXT GENERATION: The company also showcased automated machines, including a nursing robot called Nurabot, which is to enter service at a Taichung hospital this year Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) expects server revenue to exceed its iPhone revenue within two years, with the possibility of achieving this goal as early as this year, chairman Young Liu (劉揚偉) said on Tuesday at Nvidia Corp’s annual technology conference in San Jose, California. AI would be the primary focus this year for the company, also known as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團), as rapidly advancing AI applications are driving up demand for AI servers, Liu said. The production and shipment of Nvidia’s GB200 chips and the anticipated launch of GB300 chips in the second half of the year would propel
RSS