The Taiwan Stock Exchange Corporation (TWSE) actively responds to changes and development trends in the domestic and international financial environment, and closely observes the reshuffling and repositioning of the global capital market. As an important part of the Asian capital market, the TWSE is committed to channeling international funds into Taiwan to realize Taiwan’s key position in the Asian capital market, and promoting Taiwan to an international-level capital market. To achieve this vision, the TWSE has actively launched a series of international development activities since 2023, and visited major institutional investors in Asia, Americas and Europe to enhance investors’ understanding of the TWSE. In addition, the TWSE has fully recognized from these activities the attention of institutional investors to the market value and liquidity of Taiwan’s capital market, as well as the importance of future industrial development trends and corporate ESG implementation and execution.
Based on the sixty years of efforts of the TWSE, Taiwan has entered a new era in the capital market, and the liquidity of Taiwan stocks has steadily increased under the continuous improvement of market systems. This year, the Taiex has reached 22,000 points with a daily average value exceeding NT$400 billion, and the trading value now ranks number 9 in the world. This milestone is a significant achievement based on the excellent fundamentals of Taiwan stocks and the steady development of ESG, as well as the joint efforts of the TWSE, listed companies, and investors. The rise in both price and volume, and the steady growth in the number of listed companies and participating investors have further increased the responsibility of the TWSE.
To continuously strengthen the capital market’s international competitiveness, the TWSE will fully leverage its capital market links, attach importance to investor needs, and adopt a dual approach from both the corporate and financial aspects. It will not only play the role of a fundraising partner for enterprises, but also continue to enhance Taiwan’s capital market competitiveness, as well as strive to attract more domestic and foreign investment, introduce capital vitality, and create sufficient innovation and growth momentum for Taiwan’s economy. As Taiwanese listed companies have a complete technology industry supply chain and play a key role in the development of international advanced technology, the TWSE encourages enterprises to accelerate digital transformation, apply innovative technology to enhance operational efficiency, and improve market competitiveness and value to propel Taiwan’s capital market into the next era.
In 2024, the TWSE will focus on “strengthening the capital market and enhancing market value” as one of its annual development priorities. This plan aims to promote the sound development of the capital market and enhance the value of Taiwan’s capital market with the support of the ten major policies under the three major strategies, namely “enhancing corporate value” in the corporate perspective, “leading industry development” through the TWSE platform, and “increasing enterprise exposure” by deepening investor communication.
Strategy 1:Corporate Perspective – “Enhancing Corporate Value”: Improving Corporate Governance and Sustainable Disclosure
- “Encouraging companies to value shareholder value”:The TWSE encourages companies to respond to the shareholder value action plan advocated by the international capital market, and plans to add the “Enterprise Value Enhancement Plan” to the “Corporate Governance Best Practice Principles for TWSE/TPEx Listed Companies” to guide listed companies to internalize the importance of shareholder value into their corporate DNA, set up a special area to disclose shareholder value feedback information and important investment and financial indicators that investors are concerned about, and include the ratio of stock price to net asset value in the market making reward measures.
- “Improving the disclosure of sustainability information”:Global capital markets are increasingly paying attention to ESG related issues and emphasizing the steady and sustainable operation of enterprises. Since the establishment of the Corporate Governance Center in 2013, the TWSE has continuously improved its corporate governance roadmap, and evolved it into a sustainable development roadmap in 2020. It requires all listed companies to prepare a sustainability report by 2025, will transform Corporate Governance Evaluation into ESG Evaluation by 2026, and requires all listed companies to complete greenhouse gas inventory (by 2027) and assurance reporting (by 2029), so as to promote corporate awareness of responsibility on sustainability by continuously improving corporate governance and disclosure information.
Strategy 2:The TWSE Platform – “Leading Industry Development”: Consolidating Existing Industries to Lead the New Economy
- “Leading the development of diversified industries with the technology industry”:The application of innovative technology has become an indispensable element of industrial development, and Taiwan’s high-tech industry has a complete industrial chain and its own ecosystem for the technology industry. To lead industry diversification, the TWSE will focus on the development of the new economy (green energy and environmental services, digital and cloud services and biotechnology and medical care) industry clusters by enhancing the performance of capital market financing platforms and combining the power of dual engines (the general board and the innovation board). The TWSE hopes to work together with the public sector and innovation ecosystem resources to form a “National Innovation Team” to assist in industrial transformation and upgrading, and elevate Taiwan’s new economic status.
- “Increasing industrial chain links”:In order to expand opportunities for industrial chain cooperation and leverage the synergy of the big leading the small, the TWSE will invite the heads of listed companies with good market value and profitability to hold a summit on strengthening Taiwan’s capital market to promote cross-industry exchanges among enterprises, and create new elements and opportunities through experience sharing on innovation and sustainability issues. The TWSE expects to hold themed exchange events and large-scale “New Economy Industrial Chain Symposium” on green energy and environmental services, digital and cloud services and biotechnology and medical care in 2024, and invite upstream and downstream industries, ecosystems, venture capital, IPO intermediaries and other units to exchange ideas, in order to accelerate the growth of new ventures and enhance financing opportunities for innovative industries.
Strategy 3:Investors – “Increasing Corporate Exposure”: Encouraging Communication, Strengthening Capital Attraction, and Valuing Information Disclosure
- “IR ESG Engagement Platform”:The TWSE will collaborate with Taiwan Index Plus (TIP) to establish an IR ESG engagement platform to support institutional investors in corporate ESG engagement information, assist TWSE- and TPEx-listed companies in the appointment service and information links of their briefings for institutional investors, and facilitate engagement meetings between institutional investors and enterprises, with the purpose to provide media services for the engagement between small and medium TWSE- and TPEx-listed companies and investors, and deepen investor relations.
- “Encouraging communication through briefings for institutional investors”:The TWSE invites high-quality enterprises by industry every quarter to hold themed performance presentations to increase their exposure. At the same time, the TWSE encourages enterprises with a market value of over NT$10 billion to hold more than two briefings for institutional investors each year, and will in the long run require all listed companies by regulations to hold two briefings each year, in order to expand investor communication channels and enhance enterprise visibility.
- “Enhancing the performance of domestic and international capital attraction”:As a fundraising platform, the TWSE will strive to smooth the flow of funds and enhance market visibility, and continue attracting investment through a dual-track parallel model of new regions and diversified patterns. In 2024, in addition to traveling to Europe and Singapore for physical investment attraction overseas in March and April respectively, as well as holding the first physical investment attraction event in Taipei with HSBC Securities in June, the TWSE plans to develop funds in the Middle East region in the second half of the year, and hold another large-scale investment attraction event in Taipei to continue showcasing its international brand power. In the future, the TWSE will expand cooperation with Japanese and Korean exchanges, and gather capital market resources from Taiwan and other countries through joint marketing with international exchanges, in order to expand communication channels for domestic and foreign investors and enhance corporate visibility.
- “International Cooperation in Developing New ESG Indices”:The TWSE will collaborate with Taiwan Index Plus (TIP) and international index companies or database organizations to develop ETF products that are differentiated and market leading. In 2024, priority is given to developing net zero transformation or climate resilience thematic indices to expand Taiwan’s ESG thematic indices, promote sustainable and responsible investment, and improve the exposure of companies with good ESG performance.
- “Optimizing Information Disclosure Platforms”:In order to meet the needs of investors and provide more comprehensive information than the international capital market does, the TWSE has completed the optimization of ESG InfoHub in 2024 by establishing an integrated IPO information disclosure zone and expanding the content and capacity of the ESG database. In addition, it plans to optimize the Investment Information Center and ETF 2.0, and improve the interface of the Market Observation Post System, hoping to improve investor satisfaction through the improvement of information disclosure channels and optimization of the user interface.
- “Improving the content of English information”:The TWSE deeply recognizes the importance of international integration, and has been promoting the bilingual policy for the capital market since 2020 to gradually guide listed companies to engage in dialogue with international investors. In 2024, the TWSE took the lead in the Asian capital market to complete comprehensive English disclosure measures for important information such as material information, annual financial reports, and annual reports for shareholders’ meetings. In the future, the TWSE will continue moving toward the goals of improving the quality of English information disclosure, encouraging companies to issue the English version of their sustainability reports, and strengthening the English information of ETFs, in order to attract the participation of domestic and foreign capital and enhance international visibility.
Looking to the future, the TWSE is committed to developing the local capital market into an international-level capital market, promoting both its safety and development, continuously guiding enterprises to enhance their governance capabilities, encouraging industrial innovation and development, enhancing communication with market participants, and achieving the goal of strengthening the value of Taiwan’s capital market. The TWSE will take the initiative to innovate through action, strive to strengthen the overall resilience of the capital market, actively respond to digital and net zero transformation, and seek the growth momentum for the new generation, in the hope to become the most solid backing for enterprises, and create a more resilient and innovative capital market together with market participants.