Dongfeng Motor Group Co (東風汽車), China’s third-largest automaker, said it had received proposals from investment banks to buy assets from General Motors Corp (GM) as the US carmaker tries to avoid running out of cash.
“We’ve gotten e-mails and investment materials asking us whether we would be interested in buying some of GM’s assets,” Hu Xindong (胡信東), head of investor relations, said by telephone yesterday. “So far, our management has not yet reviewed the issues and we have not yet responded.”
He declined to name the investment banks or the assets. GM said it was not in talks with Dongfeng.
GM is seeking a buyer for its Hummer unit and has said it will consider options for Saab and Saturn as it asks Congress for US$18 billion in aid. Dongfeng and SAIC Motor Corp (上海汽車), the country’s largest automaker, aim to add overseas brands to help boost sales outside of their home market.
“To get enough capital to invest overseas is not a problem for Chinese companies including automakers,” said Yu Bing (餘兵), an analyst at Pingan Securities Co (平安證券) in Shanghai. “But they are more and more aware of possible risks involving overseas acquisition, including issues about local legal regulation and labor union.”
“There are no grounds to these rumors” about Dongfeng looking at assets, said Henry Wong, GM’s Shanghai-based spokesman. “We do not comment on speculation in the press.”
GM, Ford Motor Co and Chrysler LLC, are seeking US$34 billion from the US government to stave off an industry collapse. Ford is exploring the sale of its Volvo unit as it focuses on its namesake brand.
Western financial companies have turned to Chinese investors for money as they seek to shore up capital eroded by almost US$1 trillion in writedown and losses triggered by the collapse of the US subprime mortgage market.
Blackstone Group LP, manager of the world’s largest buyout fund, agreed last month to allow China Investment Corp (中國投資公司), its second-largest outside shareholder, to raise its stake to as much as 12.5 percent.
SAIC paid US$116 million for the design rights of MG Rover Group Ltd’s Rover 25 and 75 models in 2005. The Shanghai-based company also owns 51 percent of South Korea’s Ssangyong Motor Co.
Stephen Garrett, a 27-year-old graduate student, always thought he would study in China, but first the country’s restrictive COVID-19 policies made it nearly impossible and now he has other concerns. The cost is one deterrent, but Garrett is more worried about restrictions on academic freedom and the personal risk of being stranded in China. He is not alone. Only about 700 American students are studying at Chinese universities, down from a peak of nearly 25,000 a decade ago, while there are nearly 300,000 Chinese students at US schools. Some young Americans are discouraged from investing their time in China by what they see
Taiwan Transport and Storage Corp (TTS, 台灣通運倉儲) yesterday unveiled its first electric tractor unit — manufactured by Volvo Trucks — in a ceremony in Taipei, and said the unit would soon be used to transport cement produced by Taiwan Cement Corp (TCC, 台灣水泥). Both TTS and TCC belong to TCC International Holdings Ltd (台泥國際集團). With the electric tractor unit, the Taipei-based cement firm would become the first in Taiwan to use electric vehicles to transport construction materials. TTS chairman Koo Kung-yi (辜公怡), Volvo Trucks vice president of sales and marketing Johan Selven, TCC president Roman Cheng (程耀輝) and Taikoo Motors Group
MAJOR DROP: CEO Tim Cook, who is visiting Hanoi, pledged the firm was committed to Vietnam after its smartphone shipments declined 9.6% annually in the first quarter Apple Inc yesterday said it would increase spending on suppliers in Vietnam, a key production hub, as CEO Tim Cook arrived in the country for a two-day visit. The iPhone maker announced the news in a statement on its Web site, but gave no details of how much it would spend or where the money would go. Cook is expected to meet programmers, content creators and students during his visit, online newspaper VnExpress reported. The visit comes as US President Joe Biden’s administration seeks to ramp up Vietnam’s role in the global tech supply chain to reduce the US’ dependence on China. Images on
New apartments in Taiwan’s major cities are getting smaller, while old apartments are increasingly occupied by older people, many of whom live alone, government data showed. The phenomenon has to do with sharpening unaffordable property prices and an aging population, property brokers said. Apartments with one bedroom that are two years old or older have gained a noticeable presence in the nation’s six special municipalities as well as Hsinchu county and city in the past five years, Evertrust Rehouse Co (永慶房產集團) found, citing data from the government’s real-price transaction platform. In Taipei, apartments with one bedroom accounted for 19 percent of deals last