Japan’s new mutual-fund sales this month rose to the highest level since the Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc bankruptcy in September, indicating private investors may be regaining their appetite for risk, Morningstar Japan KK said.
Sales of new mutual funds rose to ¥333 billion (US$3.5 billion) this month, the most since July last year, data compiled by Bloomberg showed.
CONFIDENCE
Japanese consumer confidence climbed to a 10-month high last month, and the Nikkei 225 Stock Average has gained 35 percent from the 26-year low reached on March 10.
“Investors’ latitude has widened as investments, including Chinese and Indian stocks and bonds, have risen in value,” said Tomoaki Fujii, a senior analyst at Morningstar Japan.
Nomura Holdings Inc, Japan’s biggest securities firm, posted ¥232 billion in total sales of three funds this month as its “Nomura Global Semiconductor Stocks 0905” attracted ¥87.6 billion, the most for a single fund since November 2007.
INQUIRIES
“We have a lot of inquiries for new funds,” said Riyo Azechi, a spokeswoman at Nomura Holdings. “I have the impression that more customers are investing in stock-related funds, including overseas shares.”
Individual investors ready to jump back into stocks are following some institutions with similar risk appetite. Nippon Life Insurance Co, Japan’s biggest life insurer, said last month it planned to increase investment in equities by as much as ¥100 billion, bucking a trend that had smaller rivals maintaining or trimming holdings.
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