Royal Philips Electronics NV, Europe’s largest maker of consumer electronics, posted its first quarterly loss in almost six years after writing down the value of stakes in LG Display Co and NXP BV.
Philips said it would stop buying back stock to preserve cash. The fourth-quarter net loss was 1.47 billion euros (US$1.9 billion), or 1.57 euros a share, compared with a profit of 1.39 billion euros, or 1.30 euros, a year earlier, the Amsterdam-based company said in a statement yesterday. It was the company’s first quarterly loss since the first quarter of 2003, Bloomberg data shows.
Philips, led by chief executive officer Gerard Kleisterlee, said on Dec. 4 it would write down its stakes in LG Display, the world’s second-largest maker of liquid-crystal displays, and NXP, Europe’s third-biggest maker of semiconductors, by 1.1 billion euros. Markets for the consumer lifestyle and lighting businesses were deteriorating, the company said at the time.
The net loss had been seen at 1.24 billion euros, the median estimate of nine analysts Bloomberg News surveyed by telephone and e-mail. Fourth-quarter sales fell to 7.6 billion euros, from 8.37 billion euros a year earlier, beating the median estimate of 7.2 billion euros.
Philips shares dropped 51 percent in the past year in Amsterdam trading, compared with a 47 percent slide for the benchmark Amsterdam Exchanges Index.
“Our fourth-quarter results confirm the expectation we expressed early December that the short-term economic outlook is worsening and that 2009 is likely to be a very challenging year,” the company said in the statement.
Philips will pay a dividend of 70 euro cents a share, unchanged from last year.
The company will cut 6,000 jobs this year, Kleisterlee said in a conference call with reporters yesterday.
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
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
US CONSCULTANT: The US Department of Commerce’s Ursula Burns is a rarely seen US government consultant to be put forward to sit on the board, nominated as an independent director Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, yesterday nominated 10 candidates for its new board of directors, including Ursula Burns from the US Department of Commerce. It is rare that TSMC has nominated a US government consultant to sit on its board. Burns was nominated as one of seven independent directors. She is vice chair of the department’s Advisory Council on Supply Chain Competitiveness. Burns is to stand for election at TSMC’s annual shareholders’ meeting on June 4 along with the rest of the candidates. TSMC chairman Mark Liu (劉德音) was not on the list after in December last