Market Trend

According to the latest survey by WitsView, a research division of TrendForce, MCI index inched up by 35 points to 6408 points from November 29 to December 14, 2010. A WitsView’s survey on panel shipments indicated that the overall shipments grew by 9.5% MoM to 58.32 million units in November. With the approach of the Chinese New Year holiday, downstream vendors started to restock early one after another in order to avoid material and labor shortage problems, leading to a 10% MoM growth in panel demand. Therefore, since panel price was sustained by the strong demand, the decline was limited, IT products in particular. The stabilized prices and volume benefited panel makers’ future development. Additionally, Taiwan panel makers’ huge price-fixing fines imposed by the EU urged Taiwan government to approve the industry investment in China, leading to the slight increase in MCI index. However, NTD appreciated, and BestBuy had to downgrade its financial forecast for the year, which not only had impact on the export from Taiwan electronics industry, but also suggested a gradual slowdown in demand. Thus, MCI index trend will likely be affected.