European shares closed on a weak note on Friday as oil prices hovered near record highs tied to unrest in the Middle East and as Wall Street racked up sizable losses.
Germany's DAX Xetra 30 declined 1.9 percent to 5,422. France's CAC-40 dropped 1.5 percent to 4,780 and the UK's FTSE 100 index slid 1 percent to 5,707.
For the week, the benchmark German stock index dropped nearly 5 percent, with a profit warning from SAP and higher oil prices turning investor sentiment sour. What looked like it would be the third consecutive triple-digit decline in the Dow Jones Industrial Average placed additional pressure on European stocks.
The Bank of Japan added to worldwide rate-hike concerns with its expected quarter-point increase in its key interest rate, ending the nation's five-year-old policy of keeping interest rates near zero.
Declining European stocks came amid higher oil prices, which hovered around US$78 a barrel.
"With Israel indicating that it is preparing for a prolonged assault, investors should be prepared to see oil prices climbing even higher," Standard & Poor's European equity strategists said, referring to Israel's military moves against Lebanon following the abduction of two of its soldiers.
LVMH Moet Hennessy Louis Vuitton, the luxury-goods maker, and truck maker Man AG were among Friday's worst performers, with each stock losing 3 percent.
Man's CEO Hakan Samuelsson said the company is on track to meet its sales growth target amid speculation the company wants to buy a stake in Navistar International. Samuelsson denied that speculation.
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