Taipei, Nov. 27 (CNA) The Taiwan Stock Exchange (TWSE) said Saturday Chairman Schive Chi will visit high tech firms located in the Silicon Valley of California in a bid to encourage them to list on the local main board.

Schive will make a presence in a road show to be held in the high-tech hub on Nov. 30 and Dec. 1 to meet with potential share issuers and brief them about Taiwan’s capital market and regulations for listings, the exchange said.

The TWSE said such close contacts with the U.S. high-tech companies are expected to enhance mutual understanding between the exchange and the foreign firms.

The exchange is determined to help foreign share issuers resolve possible difficulties in fundraising in Taiwan and remove hurdles down the road for listings, in an attempt to boost Taiwan’s visibility in the global financial market, the TWSE said.

According to the TWSE, the exchange is relaxing restrictions on listings by foreign enterprises to compete with its counterparts in the region to solicit foreign firms’ listings. It hopes Taiwan will serve as a tech-rich NASDAQ-like capital market in Asia.

The TWSE said it aims to add the number of TDR issuers to 100 on the main board over the next five years.

As of the end of October, a total of 743 companies, including foreign firms which made primary listings and Taiwan depositary receipt (TDR) issuers, were listed on the main board.

Earlier this month, Schive said the TWSE-listed companies, riding the wave of an economic recovery, are expected to post NT$1.4 trillion (US$45.97 billion) in net profit in 2010, marking a record high.

Schive also said the dividend yield is expected to top 4 percent in 2010 on the improving bottom line, higher than the 2.76 percent recorded for 2009.

In the first three quarters of this year, the listed companies in the exchange registered NT$732.59 billion in net profit, representing 91.6 percent of the figure posted for the whole of 2009.

(Tien Yu-pin and Frances Huang)

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