Taiwan’s exports totaled US$479.4 billion last year, accounting for 1.9 percent of global volume, or 17th in the world, down one place from a year earlier, the Ministry of Finance said yesterday, citing WTO data.
The drop in ranking came amid an increase in global trade by 11.5 percent to US$24.9 trillion, despite a global slowdown induced by inflation and monetary tightening, the ministry said.
China retained first place with a trade volume of US$3.59 trillion, or a 14.4 percent share, followed by the US at US$2.06 trillion, Germany’s US$1.66 trillion, Japan’s US$746.9 billion and South Korea’s US$683.6 billion, it said.
Photo: CNA
Hong Kong ranked 10th with US$609.9 billion and Singapore was 16th with US$515.8 billion, putting Taiwan behind major trade rivals.
China in 2009 overtook Germany and the US as the world’s largest exporter, as it has grown to become a major part of global supply chains due to its demographic advantages, the ministry said.
China retained its top spot despite COVID-19 lockdowns of major Chinese cities for most of last year.
Taiwan’s global share of exports rose 0.3 percentage points, while Japan and Germany lost ground, the ministry said.
Taiwan, home to the world’s largest chip suppliers, has been affected by a global inventory adjustment cycle for technology products since the second half of last year, it said.
The US topped the list of nations for most imports followed by China, Germany, the Netherlands and Japan, it said.
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) would not produce its most advanced technologies in the US next year, Minister of Economic Affairs J.W. Kuo (郭智輝) said yesterday. Kuo made the comment during an appearance at the legislature, hours after the chipmaker announced that it would invest an additional US$100 billion to expand its manufacturing operations in the US. Asked by Taiwan People’s Party Legislator-at-large Chang Chi-kai (張啟楷) if TSMC would allow its most advanced technologies, the yet-to-be-released 2-nanometer and 1.6-nanometer processes, to go to the US in the near term, Kuo denied it. TSMC recently opened its first US factory, which produces 4-nanometer
GREAT SUCCESS: Republican Senator Todd Young expressed surprise at Trump’s comments and said he expects the administration to keep the program running US lawmakers who helped secure billions of dollars in subsidies for domestic semiconductor manufacturing rejected US President Donald Trump’s call to revoke the 2022 CHIPS and Science Act, signaling that any repeal effort in the US Congress would fall short. US Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, who negotiated the law, on Wednesday said that Trump’s demand would fail, while a top Republican proponent, US Senator Todd Young, expressed surprise at the president’s comments and said he expects the administration to keep the program running. The CHIPS Act is “essential for America leading the world in tech, leading the world in AI [artificial
REACTIONS: While most analysts were positive about TSMC’s investment, one said the US expansion could disrupt the company’s supply-demand balance Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co’s (TSMC, 台積電) new US$100 billion investment in the US would exert a positive effect on the chipmaker’s revenue in the medium term on the back of booming artificial intelligence (AI) chip demand from US chip designers, an International Data Corp (IDC) analyst said yesterday. “This is good for TSMC in terms of business expansion, as its major clients for advanced chips are US chip designers,” IDC senior semiconductor research manager Galen Zeng (曾冠瑋) said by telephone yesterday. “Besides, those US companies all consider supply chain resilience a business imperative,” Zeng said. That meant local supply would
Servers that might contain artificial intelligence (AI)-powering Nvidia Corp chips shipped from the US to Singapore ended up in Malaysia, but their actual final destination remains a mystery, Singaporean Minister for Home Affairs and Law K Shanmugam said yesterday. The US is cracking down on exports of advanced semiconductors to China, seeking to retain a competitive edge over the technology. However, Bloomberg News reported in late January that US officials were probing whether Chinese AI firm DeepSeek (深度求索) bought advanced Nvidia semiconductors through third parties in Singapore, skirting Washington’s restrictions. Shanmugam said the route of the chips emerged in the course of an
RSS