■ Bad loans
Bank head says he won't quit
The governor of Thailand's central bank has dismissed rumors he would quit over a bad-loan crisis at the country's second largest lender, according to reports yesterday. Shares in Krung Thai Bank (KTB) have slumped 32 percent since last month when the bank revealed that its non-performing loans had increased by 57 percent in the second quarter. "Why should I resign? I have done the right thing in strengthening Krung Thai Bank financially to restore confidence among local and foreign investors," M.R. Pridiyathorn Devakula was quoted as telling reporters in The Nation newspaper. The Bank of Thailand head came under fire after reports of lax lending practices at KTB and he was forced to defend its supervision of the sector.
■ Investment
Singapore probes Vietnam
More than 60 executives from Singapore will converge in Vietnam on a four-day business scouting trip starting on Tuesday. Seeking new ventures in the quickly liberalizing economy, the executives will be accompanied by Acting Second Minister for Finance and Senior Minister of State for Foreign Affairs Raymond Lim to Hanoi and Ho Chi Minh City. The companies represented are in the infrastructure, logistics, healthcare and lifestyle fields, said Lee Yi Shyan, chief executive of International Enterprise Singapore, the trade promotion agency.
■ Economy
Canadian trade surplus up
Canada's merchandise trade surplus hit a record C$8.6 billion (US$6.5 billion) in June, Statistics Canada said. The surplus, which was well above economists' forecasts, resulted from increased demand worldwide as well as the economic recovery in the US, the agency said. The government agency said that exports from Canada rose 4.4 percent during June. At the same time, imports fell by 3.7 percent. Much of the decline in imports reflected reduced imports of machinery and other equipment, particularly from the US. Overall, Canadian exports to the US rose 2.9 percent while purchases from the US declined 3.6 percent. Canada's trade surplus with the US stood at C$10.7 billion, its second-highest level in history.
■ Exports
Brazil raises outlook
Citing stronger-than-expected exports in the first seven months of the year, Brazil's government raised its trade surplus forecast for this year to US$30 billion, up from a record US$24.8 billion last year. The Trade Ministry also said it now expected exports to total US$90 billion at the end of the year, up from a previous estimate of US$88 billion. Last year, Brazilian exports rose 21 percent, to US$73 billion. President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, who took office in January last year, has said he expects annual exports to reach US$100 million before the end of his four-year term.
■ Telecoms
Warburg sells Bharti shares
The private equity firm Warburg Pincus sold a 3.35 percent stake in India's second-largest mobile services company, Bharti Tele-Ventures Ltd. According to a statement to India's stock exchanges Friday, Brentwood Investment Holdings Ltd, a unit of Warburg Pincus, sold 62 million shares. Citigroup Global Markets, which arranged the sale, said Warburg Pincus was paid US$207 million for the shares, according to Bloomberg News. Warburg Pincus, which is based in New York, is left with a 15.17 percent stake in Bharti.
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”
TRANSFORMATION: Taiwan is now home to the largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, thanks to the nation’s economic policies President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday attended an event marking the opening of Google’s second hardware research and development (R&D) office in Taiwan, which was held at New Taipei City’s Banciao District (板橋). This signals Taiwan’s transformation into the world’s largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, validating the nation’s economic policy in the past eight years, she said. The “five plus two” innovative industries policy, “six core strategic industries” initiative and infrastructure projects have grown the national industry and established resilient supply chains that withstood the COVID-19 pandemic, Tsai said. Taiwan has improved investment conditions of the domestic economy
Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 0.7 percent and 13.6 percent respectively from a year earlier, setting record highs for the month of March, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Sales in the wholesale sector also grew last month by 4.6 annually, mainly due to the business opportunities for emerging applications related to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing technologies, the ministry said in a report. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales this month would retain their growth momentum as the former would benefit from Tomb Sweeping Day