MARKETS
Foreign sell-off tapers
Foreign investors last week sold a net NT$63.44 billion (US$2.25 billion) of local shares after selling NT$166.54 billion a week earlier, the Taiwan Stock Exchange said in a statement yesterday. As of Friday, foreign investors had sold NT$258.46 billion of local shares from the beginning of the year, it said. Last week, the top three shares foreign investors sold were Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (台積電), Shin Kong Financial Holding Co (新光金控) and China Development Financial Holding Corp (中華開發金控), while the top three were CTBC Financial Holding Co (中信金控), China Steel Corp (中鋼) and Evergreen Marine Corp (長榮海運), the exchange said. The market capitalization of shares held by foreign investors was NT$23.23 trillion, or 42.28 percent of total market capitalization, it said.
MEMORYCHIPS
Macronix posts strong gains
Memorychip maker Macronix International Co (旺宏電子) yesterday reported consolidated revenue of NT$3.62 billion for last month, up 20.27 percent from a year ago, on strong market demand. While last month’s figure fell 2.54 percent from January, it was still the highest February level in the company’s history, the company said. Cumulative revenue in the first two months of the year totaled NT$7.34 billion, up 21.97 percent from NT$6.02 billion in the same period last year. Macronix is a leading producer of nonvolatile memory products such as ROM and NOR flash, which are used in a variety of electronic devices. The company said it remains positive about this year’s outlook, as the supply of NOR flash memorychips has become tight and the price should continue to rise.
COMPUTERS
Advantech ratio stays high
Industrial computer manufacturer Advantech Co (研華) yesterday said its book-to-bill ratio remained high at 1.31 percent last month, slightly lower than 1.38 percent in the January-February period, thanks to improving product sales amid a global demand recovery. Consolidated sales were NT$4.67 billion last month, up 29.13 percent from NT$3.62 billion a year ago. Accumulated sales in the first two months totaled NT$10.06 billion, up 23.71 percent year-on-year, the company said in a statement. By geographic region, North America and Europe registered sales growth of 33 percent and 39 percent respectively, while emerging markets registered 44 percent during the two-month period, it said. While the company’s embedded Internet of Things (IoT) group, applied computing group and service-IoT group reported strong sales in the first two months, the cloud-IoT group saw sales slightly decline due to component shortages and a high comparison base last year, it added.
COSMETICS
Chlitina reports flat revenue
Chlitina Holding Ltd (麗豐), which makes and sells cosmetics and skincare products, yesterday said revenue last month was flat from a year ago at NT$266.33 million, as the Lunar New Year holiday cut the number of working days, while sales at its beauty salon franchises in China’s Guangdong Province and Shanghai city were affected by COVID-19 flare-ups. Cumulative revenue in the first two months of this year fell 9.97 percent to NT$623.31 million from a year earlier, the company said. Worldwide, the company operates 4,994 franchisees, including 4,753 in China, the company said. With marketing campaigns and promotional activities beginning this month, the company said it expects growth momentum to emerge in the first half of this year.
MULTIFACETED: A task force has analyzed possible scenarios and created responses to assist domestic industries in dealing with US tariffs, the economics minister said The Executive Yuan is tomorrow to announce countermeasures to US President Donald Trump’s planned reciprocal tariffs, although the details of the plan would not be made public until Monday next week, Minister of Economic Affairs J.W. Kuo (郭智輝) said yesterday. The Cabinet established an economic and trade task force in November last year to deal with US trade and tariff related issues, Kuo told reporters outside the legislature in Taipei. The task force has been analyzing and evaluating all kinds of scenarios to identify suitable responses and determine how best to assist domestic industries in managing the effects of Trump’s tariffs, he
TIGHT-LIPPED: UMC said it had no merger plans at the moment, after Nikkei Asia reported that the firm and GlobalFoundries were considering restarting merger talks United Microelectronics Corp (UMC, 聯電), the world’s No. 4 contract chipmaker, yesterday launched a new US$5 billion 12-inch chip factory in Singapore as part of its latest effort to diversify its manufacturing footprint amid growing geopolitical risks. The new factory, adjacent to UMC’s existing Singapore fab in the Pasir Res Wafer Fab Park, is scheduled to enter volume production next year, utilizing mature 22-nanometer and 28-nanometer process technologies, UMC said in a statement. The company plans to invest US$5 billion during the first phase of the new fab, which would have an installed capacity of 30,000 12-inch wafers per month, it said. The
Taiwan’s official purchasing managers’ index (PMI) last month rose 0.2 percentage points to 54.2, in a second consecutive month of expansion, thanks to front-loading demand intended to avoid potential US tariff hikes, the Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research (CIER, 中華經濟研究院) said yesterday. While short-term demand appeared robust, uncertainties rose due to US President Donald Trump’s unpredictable trade policy, CIER president Lien Hsien-ming (連賢明) told a news conference in Taipei. Taiwan’s economy this year would be characterized by high-level fluctuations and the volatility would be wilder than most expect, Lien said Demand for electronics, particularly semiconductors, continues to benefit from US technology giants’ effort
‘SWASTICAR’: Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s close association with Donald Trump has prompted opponents to brand him a ‘Nazi’ and resulted in a dramatic drop in sales Demonstrators descended on Tesla Inc dealerships across the US, and in Europe and Canada on Saturday to protest company chief Elon Musk, who has amassed extraordinary power as a top adviser to US President Donald Trump. Waving signs with messages such as “Musk is stealing our money” and “Reclaim our country,” the protests largely took place peacefully following fiery episodes of vandalism on Tesla vehicles, dealerships and other facilities in recent weeks that US officials have denounced as terrorism. Hundreds rallied on Saturday outside the Tesla dealership in Manhattan. Some blasted Musk, the world’s richest man, while others demanded the shuttering of his
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