GEOPOLITICAL FACTORS: An official said the US-China trade dispute and tensions between Tokyo and Seoul would limit the benefits of the tech products’ high season

Taipei Times
Date: Aug 08, 2019
By: Crystal Hsu  /  Staff reporter

The nation’s exports last month contracted 0.5 percent to US$28.2 billion, as electronics shipments picked up, but non-technology products remained a drag amid a global slowdown, the Ministry of Finance said yesterday.

“Exports for the rest of this year might stabilize, but a stalemate in US-China trade talks would limit the benefits of the high season for tech products,” Department of Statistics Director-General Beatrice Tsai (蔡美娜) told a media briefing.

Tsai’s guarded optimism came after technology heavyweight Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (台積電) last month gave positive guidance at an investors’ conference, saying that business would improve quarter by quarter.

Semiconductor shipments rose 5.9 percent to US$8.44 billion from a year earlier, outperforming a 1.8 percent growth for overall electronics exports, the mainstay of Taiwan’s trade-focused economy, the ministry said in a report.    [FULL  STORY]