OUT OF TIME:With only one day left in the latest round of negotiations, the two sides have managed to reach an agreement on only four of the nine chapters

Taipei Times
Date:  Nov 23, 2015
By: Lauly Li  /  Staff reporter

Taiwan and China are unlikely to complete the latest round of negotiations over the cross-strait trade in goods agreement today, as the two sides still have differences on major trade issues.

“We hope to achieve a major breakthrough in the last day of this round of negotiations,” Bureau of Foreign Trade (BOFT) Director-General Yang Jen-ni (楊珍妮), who led Taiwan’s negotiation team, told a teleconference yesterday after finishing the second day of the 12th round of talks.

The latest round of talks started on Saturday and is scheduled to end this evening at the Grand Hotel (圓山飯店) in Taipei.

Yang declined to confirm if Taipei and Beijing could wrap up the negotiations today.

However, as the two sides agreed on only four of the nine chapters of the agreement as of the second day of negotiations, it is unlikely that they would go through the remaining five chapters and three appendices today.     [FULL  STORY]

Focus Taiwan
Date: 2015/11/21
By: Wei Shu and Frances Huang

Taipei, Nov. 21 (CNA) Formosa Petrochemical Corp. (台塑化), a private gasoline supplier in Taiwan, said Saturday that it has decided to lower domestic fuel prices ahead of rival state-owned CPC Corp., Taiwan, (中油), effective from 1 a.m. Sunday.

It was the second consecutive week for Formosa Petrochemical to trim its fuel prices before CPC. In the latest announcement, Formosa Chemical has decided to lower gasoline prices by NT$0.7 (US$0.02) per liter and cut diesel prices by NT$0.8 per liter to a seven-year low because of the continued weakness of the international oil market.

Since February, Formosa Petrochemical, one of the subsidiaries of conglomerate Formosa Plastics Group (台塑集團), has adopted a strategy in which the gasoline supplier tends to cut prices a day earlier than CPC when fuel prices trend lower in a bid to grab higher market share.     [FULL  STORY]

Taiwan News
Date: 2015-11-21
By: Central News Agency

Taipei, Nov. 21 (CNA) The production value of Taiwan’s manufacturing sector for the third quarter of this year fell to a six-year low at a time when the world’s economy showed signs of slowing with global demand weakening, according to the Ministry of Economic Affairs (MOEA).

The continued weakness of international crude oil prices was also cited as a reason for the local manufacturing sector’s decline in output since local suppliers’ pricing power has been eroded, the MOEA said.

The MOEA said that the production value of the local manufacturing sector for the July-September period fell 15.01 percent from a year earlier to NT$3.16 trillion (US$96.63 billion).     [FULL  STORY]

Bloomberg
Date: November 20, 2015
By: Tim Culpan

For a stark depiction of how Taiwan’s technology industry has been ravaged by the rise of the smartphone and the fall of the desktop computer, look at Asia’s stock market.

The nine worst performers in Morgan Stanley’s 106-member Asia-Pacific Infotech Index this year come from Taiwan, once the leader of computer innovation and a powerhouse in hardware and semiconductor manufacturing. The sagging companies include former PC giant Acer Inc. and its manufacturing spinoff Wistron Corp. — both are down by more than 40 percent — and smartphone maker HTC Corp., once the biggest seller in the U.S.

Those suppliers of ubiquitous electronics products from memory chips to flat-panel displays have lost about $24 billion in market capitalization so far this year, or about the equivalent of an HP Inc. By contrast, the top performers are all Japanese, led by automotive electronics maker Alps Electric Co. and games distributor Nexon Co.

“Being heavily exposed to PCs has been tough a place to be this year because of economic weakness in Asia, where the market had previously remained relatively robust,” said Anand Srinivasan, an analyst with Bloomberg Intelligence.     [FULL  STORY]

STILL LAGGING:Talent flight continued to hurt businesses, as the nation’s brain-drain ranking remained unchanged in 50th place, indicating a lack of skilled personnel

Taipei Times
Date:  Nov 21, 2015
By: Crystal Hsu  /  Staff reporter

Taiwan was ranked the 23rd best nation that can retain, attract and groom talent, according to an annual report released yesterday by the International Institute for Management Development (IMD). The new ranking is four steps from Taiwan’s position last year.

This year Taiwan outperformed Japan (20), South Korea (31) and China (40), but lagged behind Singapore (10), Hong Kong (12) and Malaysia (15), the report showed.

The nation’s overall ranking improved even though various trade groups cited talent shortage as a pressing concern for doing business in Taiwan.

The IMD’s ranking considered three main categories: investment, appeal and readiness, which were derived from sub-factors including education, apprenticeship, employee training, brain-drain, cost of living, language skills and tax rates.     [FULL  STORY]

Taiwan News
Date: 2015-11-20
By: Central News Agency

Taipei, Nov. 20 (CNA) Taiwan’s export orders were valued at US$42.55 billion in October, representing a decline of 5.3 percent from the same month of last year, according to statistics released Friday by the Ministry of Economic Affairs (MOEA).

It marked the seventh consecutive monthly drop, the ministry said in a statement.

With the American and European markets entering the Christmas season, the MOEA said it expects that the traditional high demand during the season will help increase orders for the OEM assembly and related industrial sectors of Taiwan. The value of orders for information communication products reached US$14.32 billion in October, up 5.7 percent from the previous month and 11 percent from the same month of last year, the statistics show.     [FULL  STORY]