■TAIWAN
Gravel, sand demand to grow
Taiwan’s demand for gravel and sand will increase by an estimated 7.2 percent this year, as public works projects launched by the government to revive the local economy come on line. The Bureau of Mines estimated on Friday that demand for gravel and sand would reach 58 million cubic meters this year, up from 54.1 million cubic meters last year. In its plan to secure supplies to meet the forecast demand, the Ministry of Economic Affairs expects 21.7 million cubic meters of gravel and sand to come from Taiwan’s rivers, 19.8 million cubic meters to come from land sources and 16.8 million cubic meters to be imported.
■BANKING
IndyMac sale approved
The US government said on Friday it had approved the sale of bankrupt California bank IndyMac to investment group IMB Management Holdings for about US$13.9 billion. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation said it had signed a letter of intent on Wednesday to sell IndyMac Bank, which it seized in July when the bank collapsed under the weight of a bank run by depositors panicked about its viability. The consortium includes JC Flowers & Co, Paulson & Co and MSD Capital, a private investment firm created to exclusively manage the capital of Dell computer founder Michael Dell and his family.
■JAPAN
Megabanks suffer: report
Japanese megabanks Mitsubishi UFJ and Mizuho Financial appear to have experienced a group net loss in the three months to last month because of a plunging stock market, a major daily reported yesterday. It would be the first quarterly net loss for Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group since its establishment in 2005 through the merger of Mitsubishi Tokyo Financial Group and UFJ Holdings, the Mainichi Shimbun said. Mizuho Financial Group was also in the red in the previous quarter to September. But Sumitomo Mitsui Financial Group, the other of the country’s top three banks, appears to have remained in the black as the value of its stock holdings is low, the daily said.
■COTTON
Consumption drops further
Global cotton consumption will fall more than forecast last month as textile mills in China, the biggest consumer, buy less fiber to weave into clothing and bedding, the International Cotton Advisory Committee said. Worldwide use will drop 7.1 percent in the year ending July 31 to 24.5 million tonnes from a year earlier on lower use in China, India and Pakistan, the three largest consumers, the committee said today in a report. That was down from 24.9 million tons projected last month. Chinese consumption could fall 10 percent to 9.8 million tons this year, the group said. Exports will drop 17 percent to 6.9 million tons, the lowest in six seasons, the committee said. Last month, global exports were forecast at 7.3 million. Chinese imports will tumble 40 percent to 1.5 million tons, the group said.
■AVIATION
Lufthansa eyes SAS
Shares in SAS, the operator of the joint-carrier Scandinavian Airlines, surged on Friday on a report that Lufthansa is interested in the Scandinavian market and is in talks with SAS. A Lufthansa executive quoted by the Jyllands-Posten newspaper, however, did not say if a possible merger was being considered. “After the German and Italian markets, Scandinavia is one the most important for Lufthansa,” Lufthansa executive Karsten Bentz was quoted as telling the Danish daily. He declined to comment on a possible merger with SAS but said talks were ongoing.
China has claimed a breakthrough in developing homegrown chipmaking equipment, an important step in overcoming US sanctions designed to thwart Beijing’s semiconductor goals. State-linked organizations are advised to use a new laser-based immersion lithography machine with a resolution of 65 nanometers or better, the Chinese Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) said in an announcement this month. Although the note does not specify the supplier, the spec marks a significant step up from the previous most advanced indigenous equipment — developed by Shanghai Micro Electronics Equipment Group Co (SMEE, 上海微電子) — which stood at about 90 nanometers. MIIT’s claimed advances last
ISSUES: Gogoro has been struggling with ballooning losses and was recently embroiled in alleged subsidy fraud, using Chinese-made components instead of locally made parts Gogoro Inc (睿能創意), the nation’s biggest electric scooter maker, yesterday said that its chairman and CEO Horace Luke (陸學森) has resigned amid chronic losses and probes into the company’s alleged involvement in subsidy fraud. The board of directors nominated Reuntex Group (潤泰集團) general counsel Tamon Tseng (曾夢達) as the company’s new chairman, Gogoro said in a statement. Ruentex is Gogoro’s biggest stakeholder. Gogoro Taiwan general manager Henry Chiang (姜家煒) is to serve as acting CEO during the interim period, the statement said. Luke’s departure came as a bombshell yesterday. As a company founder, he has played a key role in pushing for the
EUROPE ON HOLD: Among a flurry of announcements, Intel said it would postpone new factories in Germany and Poland, but remains committed to its US expansion Intel Corp chief executive officer Pat Gelsinger has landed Amazon.com Inc’s Amazon Web Services (AWS) as a customer for the company’s manufacturing business, potentially bringing work to new plants under construction in the US and boosting his efforts to turn around the embattled chipmaker. Intel and AWS are to coinvest in a custom semiconductor for artificial intelligence computing — what is known as a fabric chip — in a “multiyear, multibillion-dollar framework,” Intel said in a statement on Monday. The work would rely on Intel’s 18A process, an advanced chipmaking technology. Intel shares rose more than 8 percent in late trading after the
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) has appointed Rose Castanares, executive vice president of TSMC Arizona, as president of the subsidiary, which is responsible for carrying out massive investments by the Taiwanese tech giant in the US state, the company said in a statement yesterday. Castanares will succeed Brian Harrison as president of the Arizona subsidiary on Oct. 1 after the incumbent president steps down from the position with a transfer to the Arizona CEO office to serve as an advisor to TSMC Arizona’s chairman, the statement said. According to TSMC, Harrison is scheduled to retire on Dec. 31. Castanares joined TSMC in