Taiwan Firms Lack Sufficient Confidence in Economic BoomThe result of the latest boom investigation published by the Taiwan Economic Research Institute shows that although Taiwan's essential economic indexes of September assume a trend of expansion, due to uncertainty in the financial field, however, more and more Taiwan manufacturers lack sufficient confidence in the economic prospect in the second half of the year.The investigation indicates that the proportion of enterprises having the belief that the economy in the coming half year will turn for the better than in September has dropped from 24 percent in August to 16.5 percent. The proportion of those viewing the prospect as bad has gone up from 26 percent to 28.9 percent. With regard to the development tendency of the financial market, it is pointed out in the investigation result that influenced by the slump of the US stock market, the selling spree of foreign capital and the turbulence of the internal political situation, the stock market of Taiwan saw a continuous decline. The weighted index fell to 6185 points at the end of September, down by 18.8 percent from that of August. As regards the exchange rate, due to the appreciation of US dollars, the fluctuation of the stock market, the slowdown of inward foreign exchange and the growth of foreign exchange deposit, the average exchange rate of NT dollars Vs US dollars in September slipped to 31.93 yuan :1, depreciating by 0.36 percent when compared with the level of the month before. |
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