TRADE
Christensen criticizes China
China is aggressively using market-distorting subsidies and other practices such as intellectual property theft and forced technology transfers that harm the global economy, including the economies of the US and Taiwan, American Institute in Taiwan (AIT) Director Brent Christensen said yesterday. “We must defend the international rule-based order and sometimes take steps to dissuade those who flout global rules,” he said in a speech at the annual congress of the World Taiwanese Chambers of Commerce in Taipei. The US is committed to open markets and free trade in the Indo-Pacific region and globally, common values that the nation shares with Taiwan, he said. The free and open Indo-Pacific strategy, introduced by the administration of US President Donald Trump in November last year, encompasses an area stretching from the US west coast to Japan, through Southeast Asia to Australia, and west to India, he said. “We are looking to work more closely with Taiwan on the Indo-Pacific strategy’s priority initiatives of energy, infrastructure and the digital economy,” he said. In the years ahead, as business relationships evolve in the Indo-Pacific region, the role and importance of Taiwanese businesses would continue to grow and expand around the world, he added. Christensen announced that the AIT would escort a delegation of Taiwanese companies to the Indo-Pacific Discover Global Markets event on aerospace, defense and advanced manufacturing to be held in Salt Lake City, Utah, from Dec. 10 to Dec. 12. The congress was also attended by former US vice president Dick Cheney and Stephen Yates, a former deputy national security adviser to Cheney.
TELECOMS
MOD subscribers at 1.9m
Chunghwa Telecom Co (中華電信), the nation’s biggest telecom, yesterday said that subscribers to its multimedia-on-demand (MOD) Internet TV business climbed to more than 1.9 million this month. That means the company is well on track to hit its target of 2 million subscribers by the end of this year. The company attributed the growth to its broadcasts of the FIFA World Cup and Asian Games. Chunghwa Telecom is set to broadcast more sports events next month, including the Chinese Taipei Open organized by the Chinese Taipei Badminton Association.
ENERGY
Research center founded
Denmark’s Orsted A/S yesterday donated a 1 megawatt energy storage system to National Changhua University of Education to further the school’s green energy curriculum. The system features energy storage equipment built by Delta Electronics Inc (台達電) and is to be installed by the Taiwanese company. Orsted also founded a research center at the university to help students develop the next generation of energy storage solutions.
PROPERTY
TLDC inks Hualien deal
Taiwan Land Development Corp (TLDC, 台灣土地開發) yesterday inked a cooperation pact with Vieshow Cinemas and VR Live for a mixed-use commercial building, the second phase of a larger development project in Hualien County. TLDC chairman Chiu Fu-sheng (邱復生) signed the agreement at the site near Hualien Bay (洄瀾灣), where TLDC is to open a building that is to house VR facilities, movie theaters, restaurants and other sports activities, the Taipei-based developer said in a statement. The building has five stories above ground and one basement, and is equipped with the latest technologies in a bid to entice visitors to the area.
The US dollar was trading at NT$29.7 at 10am today on the Taipei Foreign Exchange, as the New Taiwan dollar gained NT$1.364 from the previous close last week. The NT dollar continued to rise today, after surging 3.07 percent on Friday. After opening at NT$30.91, the NT dollar gained more than NT$1 in just 15 minutes, briefly passing the NT$30 mark. Before the US Department of the Treasury's semi-annual currency report came out, expectations that the NT dollar would keep rising were already building. The NT dollar on Friday closed at NT$31.064, up by NT$0.953 — a 3.07 percent single-day gain. Today,
‘SHORT TERM’: The local currency would likely remain strong in the near term, driven by anticipated US trade pressure, capital inflows and expectations of a US Fed rate cut The US dollar is expected to fall below NT$30 in the near term, as traders anticipate increased pressure from Washington for Taiwan to allow the New Taiwan dollar to appreciate, Cathay United Bank (國泰世華銀行) chief economist Lin Chi-chao (林啟超) said. Following a sharp drop in the greenback against the NT dollar on Friday, Lin told the Central News Agency that the local currency is likely to remain strong in the short term, driven in part by market psychology surrounding anticipated US policy pressure. On Friday, the US dollar fell NT$0.953, or 3.07 percent, closing at NT$31.064 — its lowest level since Jan.
The New Taiwan dollar and Taiwanese stocks surged on signs that trade tensions between the world’s top two economies might start easing and as US tech earnings boosted the outlook of the nation’s semiconductor exports. The NT dollar strengthened as much as 3.8 percent versus the US dollar to 30.815, the biggest intraday gain since January 2011, closing at NT$31.064. The benchmark TAIEX jumped 2.73 percent to outperform the region’s equity gauges. Outlook for global trade improved after China said it is assessing possible trade talks with the US, providing a boost for the nation’s currency and shares. As the NT dollar
The Financial Supervisory Commission (FSC) yesterday met with some of the nation’s largest insurance companies as a skyrocketing New Taiwan dollar piles pressure on their hundreds of billions of dollars in US bond investments. The commission has asked some life insurance firms, among the biggest Asian holders of US debt, to discuss how the rapidly strengthening NT dollar has impacted their operations, people familiar with the matter said. The meeting took place as the NT dollar jumped as much as 5 percent yesterday, its biggest intraday gain in more than three decades. The local currency surged as exporters rushed to
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