Taiwan Business Bank (台灣企銀) yesterday said it is seeking to improve profitability this year by expanding loans to small and medium enterprises (SMEs) and overseas operations as they generate higher margins.
The state-run lender made the announcement after posting NT$2.12 billion (US$72.74 million) in net income for the first quarter — its highest in two-and-a-half years — or earnings per share of NT$0.27.
The lender’s efforts to enhance asset quality and diversify sources of income have started to pay off, bank officials told an online investors’ conference, adding that increases in wealth management and fee income helped offset losses linked to volatile financial markets.
Photo: Chen Mei-ying, Taipei Times
The uptrend is expected to continue for the rest of this year, benefiting from monetary tightening cycles at home and abroad, the officials said.
As of March, lending to small and medium-sized enterprises totaled NT$66.85 billion, an increase of 10.04 percent from a year earlier, they said, adding that the business would continue to provide momentum to loan growth this year.
Interest spread widened from 1.31 percent in March to 1.42 percent last month, following the central bank’s interest rate hike of 25 basis points on March 17, the officials said.
The gap would increase if the central bank raises interest rates later this year, in line with global peers, they added.
Taiwan Business Bank said it would hold mortgage operations steady by focusing on first-home buyers and people with real demand, while supporting selective credit controls on multiple-home mortgages.
Banks intent on active mortgage lending would have to demonstrate higher capital adequacy to meet stricter risk requirements.
Taiwan Business Bank said it would also work toward improving business at its branches in Australia, China, Hong Kong and the US, with the aim of boosting their revenue contributions to 20 percent this year.
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) yesterday said that its investment plan in Arizona is going according to schedule, following a local media report claiming that the company is planning to break ground on its third wafer fab in the US in June. In a statement, TSMC said it does not comment on market speculation, but that its investments in Arizona are proceeding well. TSMC is investing more than US$65 billion in Arizona to build three advanced wafer fabs. The first one has started production using the 4-nanometer (nm) process, while the second one would start mass production using the
‘SILVER LINING’: Although the news caused TSMC to fall on the local market, an analyst said that as tariffs are not set to go into effect until April, there is still time for negotiations US President Donald Trump on Tuesday said that he would likely impose tariffs on semiconductor, automobile and pharmaceutical imports of about 25 percent, with an announcement coming as soon as April 2 in a move that would represent a dramatic widening of the US leader’s trade war. “I probably will tell you that on April 2, but it’ll be in the neighborhood of 25 percent,” Trump told reporters at his Mar-a-Lago club when asked about his plan for auto tariffs. Asked about similar levies on pharmaceutical drugs and semiconductors, the president said that “it’ll be 25 percent and higher, and it’ll
CHIP BOOM: Revenue for the semiconductor industry is set to reach US$1 trillion by 2032, opening up opportunities for the chip pacakging and testing company, it said ASE Technology Holding Co (日月光投控), the world’s largest provider of outsourced semiconductor assembly and test (OSAT) services, yesterday launched a new advanced manufacturing facility in Penang, Malaysia, aiming to meet growing demand for emerging technologies such as generative artificial intelligence (AI) applications. The US$300 million facility is a critical step in expanding ASE’s global footprint, offering an alternative for customers from the US, Europe, Japan, South Korea and China to assemble and test chips outside of Taiwan amid efforts to diversify supply chains. The plant, the company’s fifth in Malaysia, is part of a strategic expansion plan that would more than triple
Taiwanese artificial intelligence (AI) server makers are expected to make major investments in Texas in May after US President Donald Trump’s first 100 days in office and amid his rising tariff threats, Taiwan Electrical and Electronic Manufacturers’ Association (TEEMA, 台灣電子電機公會) chairman Richard Lee (李詩欽) said yesterday. The association led a delegation of seven AI server manufacturers to Washington, as well as the US states of California, Texas and New Mexico, to discuss land and tax issues, as Taiwanese firms speed up their production plans in the US with many of them seeing Texas as their top option for investment, Lee said. The
RSS