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Business Quick Take

■BANKING

Bank of Taiwan to sell Mega

Chinatrust Financial Holding Co (中信金控) named Bank of Taiwan (臺灣銀行) to sell its stake in Mega Financial Holding Co (兆豐金控) after the regulator ordered the share disposal. Chinatrust, Taiwan’s fifth-largest listed financial-services company, and its subsidiaries will transfer their Mega shares to government-owned Bank of Taiwan, which will sell the stock before Mega’s annual shareholder meeting in 2012, the Taipei-based company said in a filing on Friday night. Chinatrust had been ordered to sell the shares by June this year, it said. The regulator in July 2006 told Chinatrust to sell its shares in Mega, after alleging they had been purchased illegally using funds earmarked for customer loans.



■COMPUTERS

DRAM revamp moves ahead

The government’s effort to revamp the local ailing dynamic random access memory (DRAM) chip industry will move a step forward as Taiwan Memory Co (TMC, 台灣記憶體公司) will soon announce its strategic cooperation partner, sources said on Friday. John Hsuan (宣明智), who is overseeing the establishment of TMC, said at a March 10 news conference that he expected to finalize assessments and negotiations with Japan’s Elpida and the US-based Micron on the formation of strategic partnership before the end of this month.



■STEEL

Boashan profits plunge

Baoshan Iron & Steel (寶鋼), the listed unit of China’s largest steel maker, reported that its net profit for last year plunged 49.2 percent because of steep falls in demand and high costs. The company said its operations would continue to struggle because China’s steel industry has been left reeling by the global financial crisis. The Shanghai-listed steelmaker said its net profit for the 12 months ended Dec. 31 fell to 6.46 billion yuan (US$950 million) from 12.72 billion yuan in the previous year. Revenue rose 4.7 percent to 200.64 billion yuan from 191.56 billion yuan a year earlier, the company said, adding that it expected to post revenue of 145.7 billion yuan (US$21.3 billion) this year.



■INDIA

Spice Group withdraws bid

India’s Spice Group announced on Friday it was temporarily withdrawing from the race for scandal-tainted Satyam Computer Services, complaining the bidding process was not transparent, a report said. Satyam’s government-appointed board is looking for a buyer for Satyam to infuse funds into the company and ensure its survival after its finances were left in a shambles by the country’s biggest accounting fraud. “The withdrawal is for the moment,” a senior company official told the Press Trust of India.



■BREWERY

Tsingtao chooses Bangkok

China’s Tsingtao Brewery Co (青島啤酒) has set up a joint venture with Thai partners to invest 2 billion baht (US$55.5 million) in beer production near Bangkok, media reports said yesterday. Theparak Luengsuwan, one of the Thai investors, said at a press conference that Tsingtao has chosen Thailand over Malaysia for its first-ever overseas brewery partly because of a free trade agreement the kingdom has in place with Australia. Theparak said top Tsingtao executives would finalize the investment with Thai Industry Minister Charnchai Chairungrueng, who is to travel to Beijing on Wednesday through April 4 to promote investment in Thailand.


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