EZ News 02/11/26

Good afternoon, I'm _____ with today's episode of EZ News. Tai-Ex opening The Tai-Ex opened marginally higher this morning from yesterday's close, at 33,086 on turnover of 12.1-billion N-T. The market ended at a high of just over 33,000 points on Tuesday as Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing registered strong gains after its American depositary receipts closed at a record price overnight. MOEA sets aside NT$30 billion to cushion auto industry amid US tariff deal The Ministry of Economic Affairs has set aside 30-billion N-T to support Taiwan's automobile industry as it prepares for changes to tariffs under a Taiwan-US trade agreement, According to Economics Minister Kung Ming-hsin, initial assessments indicate that the impact on domestic industrial output could exceed (超過) 1-per cent but will remain "manageable." Kung says the funding will help the automobile and auto parts industry absorb (吸收)shocks, advance transformation and upgrading, and strengthen independent research and development and exports. Kung also says any tariff arrangements will apply only to US-made vehicles and such vehicles will be defined only if they meet country of origin and value-added content requirements consistent with existing international standards. Population declines for 25th consecutive month The Ministry of the Interior says the island's population fell for a 25th consecutive month in January -- with the number of live births falling by 304 from December of 2025. According to the latest data, as of the end of January, the population totaled 23,289,045, down 10,087 from December. A total of 8,723 babies were born in January, 304 fewer than in December and 772 fewer than a year earlier. The interior ministry says that translates to roughly one birth every 5.1 minutes and an annual crude birth rate (粗出生率) of 4.41 per 1,000 people. Deaths totaled 17,529 in January, or about one every 2.5 minutes and the crude death rate was 8.86 per 1,000 people White House defends Trump Canada bridge attack The White House has defended US President Donald Trump's threat to block the opening of the Gordie Howe International Bridge connecting Ontario with Michigan. Trump has told Canada his administration needs to be "fully compensated for everything", despite (儘管) both countries co-owning the bridge. Nick Harper reports from Washington on the White House press secretary Karoline Leavitt's comments. Chile Launches OpenSource AI Language Model for Latin American Culture Chile has launched the first open-source AI language model trained on Latin American culture. Called Latam-GPT, the two-year effort is led by Chile's National Center of Artificial Intelligence and supported by over 30 institutions. It aims to reflect regional realities in AI. Chilean President Gabriel Boric emphasized the importance of Latin America's role in the AI revolution. Latam-GPT, announced at the February 2025 Artificial Intelligence Action Summit in Paris, addresses linguistic biases (語言的偏誤) in models trained mainly on English data. It uses Latin American data and will initially operate in Spanish and Portuguese, with plans to include Indigenous languages later. That was the I.C.R.T. EZ News, I'm _____. -- Hosting provided by SoundOn