Gasoline, diesel prices to drop by NT$0.4 per liter
Gasoline, diesel prices to drop by NT$0.4 per literBy Chen Cheng-hui / Staff reporterGasoline and diesel prices at domestic fuel stations are to fall NT$0.4 per liter this week, after international crude oil prices last week fell for the second consecutive week, CPC Corp, Taiwan (台灣中油) and Formosa Petrochemical Corp (台塑石化) announced yesterday. Effective today, gasoline prices at CPC and Formosa stations are to drop to NT$26.4, NT$27.9 and NT$29.9 per liter for 92, 95 and 98-octane unleaded gasoline respectively, the companies said in separate statements. The price of premium diesel is to fall to NT$24.8 per liter at CPC stations and NT$24.6 at Formosa pumps, they said. The release of weak economic data from China also added pressure to oil prices, they said, adding that concerns about excess supply continue to cloud the market’s outlook after oil prices had fallen more than 20 percent this year. Meanwhile, West Texas Intermediate crude oil futures — the US oil gauge — dropped 1.36 percent to US$56.66 per barrel on the New York Mercantile Exchange.
Source:Taipei Times
December 21, 2025 16:36 UTC
Google, Apple warn staff on US visas not to travel abroad
Google, Apple warn staff on US visas not to travel abroadReutersAlphabet Inc’s Google and Apple Inc have advised some employees on US work visas to avoid international travel due to delays of up to 12 months for visa stamping appointments at embassies, Business Insider reported on Friday, citing internal memos. Google’s logo at a company research facility in Mountain View, California, is pictured on May 13. Photo: ReutersGoogle and Apple did not immediately respond to a Reuters request for comment. The administration of US President Donald Trump this month announced increased vetting of applicants for H-1B visas for highly skilled workers, including screening social media accounts. In September, Alphabet had strongly advised its employees to avoid international travel and urged H-1B visa holders to remain in the US, according to an e-mail seen by Reuters.
Source:Taipei Times
December 21, 2025 16:36 UTC
Australia to review police after shooting
An Indian national, he entered Australia on a visa in 1998. A few weeks before the Bondi Beach attack, the pair returned to Sydney from a four-week trip to the southern Philippines that is now under investigation by detectives there and in Australia. They would usually leave their rooms only for two or three hours, with the longest excursion lasting eight hours, the Philippine national security service said. Clarke Jones, an Australian National University criminologist, said it was “very, very unusual” to have a father and son as suspected perpetrators. Jones, who has worked with violent offenders in the Philippines, said the alleged gunmen’s radicalization had apparently gone “under the radar” for years after the Australian intelligence probe.
Source:Taipei Times
December 21, 2025 16:26 UTC
Moore Threads unveils new AI chips after IPO
Moore Threads unveils new AI chips after IPOCHINA RIVAL: The chips are positioned to compete with Nvidia’s Hopper and Blackwell products and would enable clusters connecting more than 100,000 chipsBloombergMoore Threads Technology Co (摩爾線程) introduced a new generation of chips aimed at reducing artificial intelligence (AI) developers’ dependence on Nvidia Corp’s hardware, just weeks after pulling off one of the most successful Chinese initial public offerings (IPOs) in years. “These products will significantly enhance world-class computing speed and capabilities that all developers aspire to,” Moore Threads CEO Zhang Jianzhong (張建中), a former Nvidia executive, said on Saturday at a company event in Beijing. The new technology, slated for mass production from next year, would enable clusters connecting more than 100,000 chips for AI training at data centers, Zhang added. Moore Threads started out earning revenue from gaming and visual rendering chips before pivoting to the accelerators vital to developing and running AI software. Moore Threads, which was blacklisted by the US in 2023, unveiled servers capable of linking tens of thousands of AI chips.
Source:Taipei Times
December 21, 2025 16:26 UTC
US revisits its export curbs on AI chips
US Representative Brian Mast, the Republican chairman of the US House Committee on Foreign Affairs, which oversees export controls, on Friday introduced a bill dubbed the AI Overwatch Act that would require the US Congress to be notified of AI chips sales to adversaries. Any processors equal to or higher in capabilities than Nvidia’s H20 would be subject to oversight, the draft bill says. The legislation would also require a certification that the chips would not be used for military, intelligence or surveillances purposes. Since the US first restricted sales of advanced AI chips in 2022, the idea of intentionally selling advanced chips to China has found scant support in Washington. I want to be convinced because I keep asking the question.”McCormick questioned the Trump administration’s argument that selling AI chips to China would slow the ability of Chinese chipmakers to gain in product performance and quality.
Source:Taipei Times
December 21, 2025 16:26 UTC
Notes from Central Taiwan: Okinawa as Taiwan
The PRC and its netizens, taking their cue from the Chinese Communist Party (CCP), are presenting Okinawa by mirroring the claims about Taiwan. Conversely, during the 1950s and 1960s, when the US governed Okinawa, Okinawan support for the reversion movement to revert Okinawa to Japanese control was widespread. Recall too that the Japanese islands to the east of Taiwan, Yoniguni, Ishigaki, and others, are governed as part of Okinawa prefecture. A conquest of Okinawa will likely result on PRC claims to any territory Okinawa once ruled, including the Amami-Oshima islands. Links between frontline Taiwan and Okinawa prefecture will get a boost this month with the opening of ferry services between Keelung and Ishigaki.
Source:Taipei Times
December 21, 2025 16:26 UTC
China extending Tibetan repression
In Beijing’s repression of Tibetans in occupied Tibet and in exile, it extends its coercive practices to anyone bearing Tibetan cultural markers, regardless of citizenship. While such repression of Tibetans has been well documented — including by the Tibetan Centre for Human Rights and Democracy — transnational cultural repression of people with affinities to Tibetan identity is becoming increasingly applied to Indians. That constitutes a form of transnational cultural repression not limited to Tibetans, and extends to those perceived to be associated with Tibetan culture, even when they are legal citizens of sovereign states. Within Tibet, efforts to erode Tibetan cultural identity have included the establishment of colonial boarding schools aimed at severing children from their language, culture and traditions. While name changes in many societies are undertaken to improve social mobility, in this context, they are increasingly driven by the need to avoid cultural repression.
Source:Taipei Times
December 21, 2025 16:26 UTC
North Korea slams nuclear Japan as threat to humanity
North Korea slams nuclear Japan as threat to humanityAFP, SEOULNorth Korea yesterday said that Japan’s nuclear ambitions “must be prevented at any cost,” after a Tokyo official reportedly suggested the country should possess atomic weapons. North Korean leader Kim Jong-un, center, visits the Kumsusan Palace of the Sun in Pyongyang with officials on Wednesday last week. “This is not a misstatement or a reckless assertion, but clearly reflects Japan’s long-cherished ambition for nuclear weaponization,” said the North Korean official, who was not named. In an address to the UN in September, North Korean Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Kim Son-gyong said his country would never surrender its nuclear weapons. North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has also said he is open to talks with Washington, provided Pyongyang is allowed to keep its nuclear arsenal.
Source:Taipei Times
December 21, 2025 16:26 UTC
Ex-HK head confession a warning for Taiwan
Ex-HK head confession a warning for TaiwanBy John ChengFormer Hong Kong chief executive Leung Chun-ying (梁振英) has chosen a curious moment to speak candidly. Lai, in his view, was simply too influential, too dangerous and too effective to be left to the market. Hong Kong did not lose its freedoms suddenly in 2020. If this is the system some still urge Taiwan to trust, then Leung’s “confession” should be required reading, not as history, but as warning. John Cheng is a retired businessman from Hong Kong now living in Taiwan.
Source:Taipei Times
December 21, 2025 16:26 UTC
Michael Mazza On Taiwan: Secret Diplomacy? Mr. Wu Goes to Israel
Mr. Wu Goes to IsraelIs a new foreign partner for Taiwan emerging in the Middle East? Both small countries facing literal existential threats, Israel and Taiwan have much to gain from closer ties. Jerusalem may be able to provide Taipei with early warning of developments in the Middle East pertinent to Taiwan. Nongovernmental elements, witting and unwitting, of a Chinese political warfare network have operated in both spaces, pushing narratives critical of Israel and Taiwan. China is an important economic partner and is securing growing diplomatic heft in the Middle East.
Source:Taipei Times
December 21, 2025 16:26 UTC
EDITORIAL: Taiwanese need better readiness
EDITORIAL: Taiwanese need better readinessA stabbing attack inside and near two busy Taipei MRT stations on Friday evening shocked the nation and made headlines in many foreign and local news media, as such indiscriminate attacks are rare in Taiwan. At Taipei Main Station, the suspect threw smoke grenades near two exits and fatally stabbed one person who tried to stop him. He then ran into the store and wounded others, before jumping from the building’s sixth floor, the National Police Agency said on Saturday. Following the incident, bystanders posted videos of the attack on social media, which were broadcast by news media. However, as indiscriminate attacks by lone actors are increasing globally, the shocking incident in Taipei underscored the pressing need to improve personal safety preparedness.
Source:Taipei Times
December 21, 2025 16:26 UTC
Outdoors clothing could help China’s ailing domestic sales
Outdoors clothing could help China’s ailing domestic salesThe trend toward outdoors athletic brands reflects a larger movement of healthier livingBy Juliana Liu / Bloomberg OpinionCOVID-19 lockdowns in China transformed the way people think about their health. In the social-media driven world of online sales, the Gorpcore trend is even more apparent. The unit that houses its Gorpcore brands accounted for only 19 percent of revenue in the first half of the year, but is the fastest-growing part of the business. Data Monday showed retail sales had slowed by a record amount, with the exception of the pandemic period. The outdoor trend is a bright spot in an otherwise challenging market that should have legs well into the new year.
Source:Taipei Times
December 21, 2025 16:26 UTC
TSMC shareholders increase after share price drop
TSMC shareholders increase after share price dropStaff writer, with CNATaiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) last week recorded an increase in the number of shareholders to the highest in almost eight months, despite its share price falling 3.38 percent from the previous week, Taiwan Stock Exchange data released on Saturday showed. As of Friday, TSMC had 1.88 million shareholders, the most since the week of April 25 and an increase of 31,870 from the previous week, the data showed. The number of shareholders jumped despite a drop of NT$50 (US$1.59), or 3.38 percent, in TSMC’s share price from a week earlier to NT$1,430, as investors took profits from their earlier gains amid volatility among tech stocks in the US. Odd-lot trading typically makes it easier for retail investors to buy high-priced stocks such as TSMC in quantities of fewer than 1,000 shares. This week, the number of investors who held 1,000 to 5,000 TSMC shares rose by 5,839 to 376,597 as of Friday, while the number of investors who held 1 million or more of TSMC shares increased by 12 to 1,541.
Source:Taipei Times
December 21, 2025 16:26 UTC
How Mexico is doing the US’ dirty work for it
It is seen instead as opening an unexpected front in US President Donald Trump’s trade war on the world. But the real reason is that Sheinbaum is spooked by the deadline, six months away, for reviewing the US-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA). But Sheinbaum shows that the trade conflicts Trump has launched are a cascading war, not some controlled confrontation. But a significant proportion of Indian exports to Mexico are not about the US at all. Opposition lawmakers pointed out that official modelers had given up on trying to estimate the effects of such a drastic change to Mexican trade policy.
Source:Taipei Times
December 21, 2025 16:26 UTC
Social ossification is killing India’s economic growth
Social ossification is killing India’s economic growthChina made good on its economic shift, but India’s economy has stagnatedBY Andy Mukherjee / Bloomberg OpinionIn 1980, neither China nor India had much representation in the global middle class — people who neither belong to the bottom half of the income distribution nor rank among the top 10 percent worldwide. China became the factory to the world; India became its back office. To unpack this puzzle, start with Indians who are outside the middle class. A stunted middle class might be a direct result of this extreme inequality. An unambitious elite spoiled by finance — plus a working class held back by inadequate education and inequities of caste and gender — are stymying the emergence of a global middle class in India.
Source:Taipei Times
December 21, 2025 16:26 UTC