Business and Finance

Formosa Plastics Group to invest US$15 billion in U.S.

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2016/11/20
By: Wei Shu and Kuo Chung-han

Taipei, Nov. 20 (CNA) Formosa Plastics Group (台塑) has proposed investment projects totalling 201611200018t0001US$15 billion in the United States, its chairman said on Sunday.

Formosa Petrochemical Corp. has proposed investment projects worth US$10 billion in Louisiana State, while Formosa Plastics has proposed investment projects worth between US$4 and US$5 billion in Texas State, both of which are under evaluation by the U.S. authorities, said Wang Wen-yuan (王文淵).

Wang made the statement at a banquet with the group’s labor union officials.    [FULL  STORY]

Legislature to tighten corporate deals rules

Taip[ei Times
Date: Nov 21, 2016
By: Staff writer, with CNA

The Legislative Yuan has tightened the rules governing the implementation of tender offers for company acquisitions in a bid to protect minority shareholders.

An amendment to the Securities and Exchange Act (證券交易法) was passed by the legislature on Friday, stipulating that potential buyers proposing tender offers must present proof of their financial stability to authorities before the acquisition process can begin.

The amendment was proposed by Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Lai Shyh-bao (賴士葆) after Bai Chi Gan Tou Digital Entertainment Co (百尺竿頭) on Aug. 30 announced that it was withdrawing a tender offer that it had proposed in late May to buy 38 million XPEC Entertainment Inc (樂陞科技) shares, or 25.17 percent of the gaming software developer, at NT$128 per share, almost 22 percent higher than XPEC’s share price at the time.

The decision by Bai Chi to walk away from the deal caught the market off-guard and led to a rout in XPEC shares, which caused massive losses for investors.    [FULL  STORY]

Manufacturing falls short of expectations

PETROCHEMICALS:Ongoing uncertainly on oil prices along with annual maintenance at a number of plants hurt the sector again last quarter, despite small improvements

Taipei Times
Date: Nov 19, 2016
By: Lauly Li / Staff reporter

Manufacturing fell short of government forcasts in the third quarter of this year, contracting for the seventh consecutive quarter due to worldwide crude oil and LCD panel price declines.

Production value declined by 1.6 percent annually to NT$3.11 trillion (US$97.16 billion) last quarter, Ministry of Economic Affairs data showed.

The ministry said production value for this quarter would grow from a year earlier on Apple Inc’s iPhone 7 launch.

“The value decline in the petrochemical and panel sectors offset the growth in the semiconductor sector,” Department of Statistics deputy director-general Wang Shu-chuan (王淑娟) said by telephone.    [FULL  STORY]

AIDC, GE ink pact on rapidly deployable energy solutions

Taiwan Today
Date: November 18, 2016

Taiwan’s Aerospace Industrial Development Corp. and U.S. conglomerate General Electric Co.

AIDC Acting President Shiah Kang (right) and GE Packaged Power President Dave Ross celebrate the establishment of a new strategic partnership between their two firms Nov. 16 in Taipei City. (Courtesy of AIDC)

AIDC Acting President Shiah Kang (right) and GE Packaged Power President Dave Ross celebrate the establishment of a new strategic partnership between their two firms Nov. 16 in Taipei City. (Courtesy of AIDC)

concluded a memorandum of understanding Nov. 16 in Taipei City to cooperate on rapidly deployable, or fast power, energy solutions in the local market and Southeast Asia.

Founded by the government in 1996 and privatized in 2014, AIDC is the nation’s leading aerospace manufacturer. Since 2000, the company has expanded its scope to include gas turbine and wind farm construction in Taiwan and biogas applications in Southeast Asia.

Under the MOU, GE will support AIDC’s engineering, procurement and construction projects with its advanced TM2500 aeroderivative gas turbines. Designed to respond to urgent power needs and emergency situations, the generators can be deployed in less than 11 days and produce up to 35 megawatts of electricity per unit.

“The partnership pushes GE-AIDC cooperation to a new level,” Shiah Kang, acting president of AIDC, said during the signing ceremony. “It creates a cooperation model for joint exploration of the fast power generation sectors in the targeted markets.”    [FULL  STORY]

ETF tracking Taiwan equities popular with investors in South Korea

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2016/11/18
By: Tien Yu-pin and Frances Huang

Taipei, Nov. 18 (CNA) An exchange traded fund (ETF) that tracks equities in Taiwan has gained a following among investors in South Korea, according to the Taiwan Stock Exchange (TWSE).

The TWSE, which operates Taiwan’s main exchange, said the Tiger Taiwan TAIEX (H) ETF issued by South Korea’s Mirae Asset Global Investments has ranked among the top 20 actively traded ETFs in Seoul, where more than 200 ETFs are listed, since it was launched in early October.

Taiwan and South Korea launched mutual listings of exchange traded funds (ETFs) in each other’s stock market on Oct. 7, a sign of closer business ties between the two countries as Taiwan sought to boost the global visibility of its equity market.

The Tiger Taiwan TAIEX (H) ETF tracks the Taiwan Stock Exchange Capitalization Weighted Stock Index (TAIEX), the benchmark index for Taiwan’s main stock market.    [FULL  STORY]

Assembly jobs unlikely to move to US

KNOW-HOW:Hon Hai said that its smartphone assemblers are well-trained to do the complex job and US workers are unlikely to have the skills or desire to do such tasks

Taipei Times
Date: Nov 19, 2016
By: Lauly Li / Staff reporter

Pegatron Corp (和碩) chairman Tung Tzu-hsien (童子賢) yesterday said it would be difficult to follow US president-elect Donald Trump’s campaign promise to move Apple Inc’s iPhone assembly lines to the US, because the US does not have complete supply chains for iPhones.

Tung said making a smartphone is not just about setting up an assembly plant. The company would also have to consider moving all the component suppliers to the US to support handset production.

“It would be a lot easier to move
Coca-Cola’s production lines than it is a smartphone’s,” Tung told reporters.    [FULL  STORY]

Chinese Taipei envoy arrives in Lima for APEC leaders’ meeting

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2016/11/17
By: Wen Kui-hsiang and S.C. Chang

Lima, Nov. 17 (CNA) People First Party Chairman James Soong (宋楚瑜), in his capacity as President 201611170032t0001Tsai Ing-wen’s (蔡英文) representative, arrived in Lima on Wednesday to attend this year’s Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) leaders’ meeting.

Soong was greeted by Peruvian Education Minister Jaime Saavedra Chanduvi upon arrival at Jorge Chavez International Airport from New York.

Soong was the first representative to arrive for the meeting which is scheduled for Nov. 19-20. APEC now has 21 member economies, including Taiwan which is a member under the official name Chinese Taipei.

Soong’s arrival was featured prominently in the web editions of the host country’s top two newspapers, La Republica and El Comercio, on Thursday.    [FULL  STORY]

Shin Kong Financial sees profit pickup

FOREIGN DEBT:The financial conglomerate expects its life insurance subsidiary to book interest income of NT$2 billion from its expanding foreign bond holdings

Taipei Times
Date: Nov 18, 2016
By: Ted Chen / Staff reporter

Shin Kong Financial Holding Co (新光金控) yesterday said it expects earnings to improve beginning this quarter, as it increases its foreign bond holdings ahead of an anticipated interest rate hike cycle in the US.

The expanding foreign bond holdings should drive up the interest income of its main unit, Shin Kong Life Insurance Co (新光人壽), by NT$2 billion (US$62.8 million), Shin Kong Financial chief financial officer Hsu Shun-yun (徐順鋆) told an investors’ conference in Taipei.

“We plan to increase our holdings of US dollar-denominated emerging market bonds by US$1.1 billion, bringing our total international bonds portfolio from NT$317.4 billion at the end of the third quarter to NT$350 billion,” Hsu said.

Hsu added that in the last quarter, the life insurer had increased its holdings of Saudi Arabian government bonds, while reducing its Chinese corporate debt and dim sum bond holdings.    [FULL  STORY]

HTC teams up with Shenzhen authorities in VR development

The China Post
Date: November 18, 2016
By: China, CNA

SHENZHEN, China — Taiwan-based smartphone vendor HTC Corp. (宏達電) said on Thursday that it

HTC Corporation Chairwoman Cher Wang (王雪紅), fourth from right, stands alongside Shenzhen city officials at the signing of the Shenzhen-HTC Strategic Cooperation Agreement on Thursday, Nov. 17. According to terms of the agreement, HTC will aid the development of Shenzhen's VR technology. (CNA)

HTC Corporation Chairwoman Cher Wang (王雪紅), fourth from right, stands alongside Shenzhen city officials at the signing of the Shenzhen-HTC Strategic Cooperation Agreement on Thursday, Nov. 17. According to terms of the agreement, HTC will aid the development of Shenzhen’s VR technology. (CNA)

has teamed up with the Shenzhen Municipal Government to raise 10 billion Chinese yuan (US$1.46 billion) for virtual reality development.

HTC signed an agreement with the Shenzhen government on Thursday to establish a strategic partnership in VR development through the Shenzhen VR industrial development fund.

The fund is designed to develop critical VR technology and allows the participation of enterprises, schools, research institutes and investors, HTC said.

In addition to the planned 10 billion yuan fund, HTC and Shenzhen city government will set up a VR research institute, providing training in the field, the Taiwanese firm said.    [FULL  STORY]

Number of furloughed workers up in November: MOL

Most of the furloughed workers were put on a leave of 5 to 8 days.

Taiwan News
Date: 2016/11/16
By: Wendy Lee , Taiwan News, Staff Writer

A total of 573 workers in Taiwan were placed on unpaid leave in November, up 223, or 64 percent

(By Taiwan News)

(By Taiwan News)

from last month’s data, according to the Ministry of Labor (MOL).

The 64 percent increase is the biggest jump in almost a year, with five more companies recording in mid-November as having workers on furlough, and most of them small businesses in the metal and machinery industry with fewer than 50 employees, said the MOL.

Most of the furloughed workers were put on a leave of 5 to 8 days.

According to government regulations, employers are allowed to place employees on furlough for up to three months.    [FULL  STORY]