A record rally in Taiwanese stocks is luring retail investors to pile into exchange-traded funds (ETFs), as local regulators stepped up warnings on the herding behavior.Two new stock ETFs this month raised a combined NT$223.1 billion (US$7.05 billion), with the latest one which ended subscriptions o
SIGNIFICANT INVESTMENT: Apple is preparing its own AI models for its iPhone iOS 18, but it has been slower in rolling out generative AI, and is seeking a partnership with Google
Apple Inc is in talks to build Google’s Gemini artificial intelligence (AI) engine into the iPhone, according to sources familiar with the situation, setting the stage for a blockbuster agreement that would shake up the AI industry.The two companies are in negotiations to let Apple license Gemini, G
Cathay United Bank (CUB, 國泰世華銀行) kick-started the new year with good news from its private banking business. CUB Private Banking has been named “Best Domestic Private Bank (Taiwan)” by Asian Private Banker for the fifth year in a row, the only financial institution in Taiwan to achieve this great fe
Google is still evaluating market demand and adjusting its plan to build a new data center in Tainan, Google Taiwan managing director of sales and operations Tina Lin (林雅芳) told the Central News Agency on Sunday.Lin was speaking after the company was questioned last year by city councilors as to why
Housing agency Hiyes International Co (海悅國際開發) and elevator maker Golden Friends Corp (崇友實業) are expecting stable business growth this year, as the local property market steadily emerges from a slowdown induced by economic uncertainty and tight monetary policy.Hiyes said business visibility is bette
China’s Longi Green Technology Energy Co (隆基綠能) — the world’s largest solar manufacturer — is cutting almost one-third of its workforce as it tries to slash costs in an industry struggling with overcapacity and fierce competition, according to people familiar with the matter.Longi plans to trim as m
The international financial magazine “The Asset” recently announced the winners of the Triple A Awards for Sustainable Finance 2024. Citi Taiwan received ten awards including the “Best Bank for Sustainable Finance” and “Best Corporate and Institutional Adviser, demonstrating that Citi’s local achiev
Elliot Randolph, a full-time street musician, plays the violin as he sits under blooming cherry blossom trees near the tidal basin in Washington, DC, on Sunday. Exceptionally warm March weather propelled Washington’s cherry blossoms to their second-earliest peak bloom in more than a century.
POLICIES: There are to be meetings by central banks regarding six of the 10 most-traded currencies this week and the results would give a hint about their perception of risks
Investors might glean more on the Fed’s resolve to ease and how close Japan is to finally exiting negative interest rates as central banks set policy for almost half the global economy.This week features the world’s biggest collection of decisions for this year to date, including judgements on the c
CLIMATE CHALLENGES: The excessive use of groundwater and global warming have worsened the crises in Indian cities as temperatures can climb up to 40°C
India’s tech hub of Bengaluru is struggling with water shortages amid a drought, with the crisis expected to escalate as summer approaches.Authorities are supplying water to residents in the city of 13 million people using tankers as a lack of rainfall dries up thousands of underground water sources
For people at the trend-setting tech festival here, the scandal that erupted after Google’s chatbot, Gemini, cranked out images of black and Asian nazi soldiers was seen as a warning about the power artificial intelligence (AI) can give tech titans.Google CEO Sundar Pichai last month slammed as “com
Gasoline and diesel prices are to rise NT$0.2 and NT$0.1 per liter respectively this week, CPC Corp, Taiwan (CPC, 台灣中油) and Formosa Petrochemical Corp (台塑石化) said yesterday, as international crude oil prices rose last week.Global oil prices rose on the back of the escalating situation in the Russia-
Swedish furniture maker IKEA plans to spend about 300 million euros (US$327 million) in South Korea over the next three years to increase market share in the East Asian country.“We are investing a lot in Asia,” Tolga Oncu, head of the company’s retail Ingka Group, said in an interview in Goyang, Sou
People walk past a wall with Chinese characters that read: “Feeling happiness until the end of the world,” near the Great Harbor Bridge in Kaohsiung yesterday.
Before the Israel-Hamas war, the women of the West Bank-based tech nonprofit Female Innovators and Investors of Middle East and North Africa (FINOMENA) had grand plans.Some were honing their coding skills ahead of a hackathon in partnership with Microsoft Corp. Others were excitedly planning to trav
They are wriggly, they are gross and they are worth more than US$2,000 a pound. Soon, fishers might be able to catch thousands of pounds of them for years to come.Baby eels, also called elvers, are likely the most valuable fish in the US on a per-pound basis — worth orders of magnitude more money at
Eclipse-themed beer. Jewelry and ornaments. Doughnuts that capture the sun’s disappearing act with the help of buttercream frosting.With April 8’s total solar eclipse right around the corner, businesses are ready for the celestial event that is to dim skies along a generous path across North America
FOURTH REVOLUTION? Asustek’s PC business would speed up later this year, the firm said, adding that AI PCs are expected to account for at least 50 percent of all PCs in 2026
PC vendor Asustek Computer Inc (華碩電腦) yesterday said it expects server revenue growth this year to exceed the annual growth rate of 50 percent last year, ahead of the company’s five-year target to increase the new business revenue by five times.While generative artificial intelligence (AI) applicati
Cathay Financial Holding Co (國泰金控) yesterday said that it expects high single-digit loan growth and flat interest margin this year, aided by improving operating conditions and expected interest rate cuts by the US.The nation’s largest financial conglomerate by asset value gave the guarded optimistic
WASHINGTON’S INCENTIVES: The CHIPS Act set aside US$39 billion in direct grants to persuade the world’s top semiconductor companies to make chips on US soil
The US plans to award more than US$6 billion to Samsung Electronics Co, helping the chipmaker expand beyond a project in Texas it has already announced, people familiar with the matter said.The money from the 2022 CHIPS and Science Act would be one of several major awards that the US Department of C