AUTOMAKERS
Honda recalls vehicles
Honda Motor Co said yesterday it would recall about 1.35 million Fit subcompacts globally to repair defective wiring in the headlights. No accident was reported from the defect, a Honda spokesman in Tokyo said. Subject to the recall are Fit cars built at Honda’s Suzuka factory in Japan between November 2001 and October 2007. About 735,000 units will be recalled in Japan. Honda will also recall 143,000 Fits exported to the US, and 385,000 units in Europe, where the model is called the Jazz. The car will also be recalled in the Middle East, Africa and Asia.
JAPAN
Corporate tax cut
The Cabinet has approved cutting the corporate tax by 5 percentage points in a bid to spur the country’s sluggish economy. The corporate tax cut is part of tax reforms approved by the Cabinet of Prime Minister Naoto Kan yesterday that still require parliamentary approval. The corporate tax rate currently stands at 40 percent. Companies have long urged the government to slash the rate, which is higher than the global average of 25 percent to 30 percent, the government said.
INDIA
Interest rates unchanged
The central bank yesterday kept its key short-term interest rates unchanged, but warned of the need for “continued vigilance” to curb inflation. After six increases since March, the Reserve Bank of India opted against a further hike, keeping the repo rate on loans to banks at 6.25 percent and the reverse repo it pays to banks for deposits at 5.25 percent. The annual inflation rate cooled to 7.48 percent last month, its lowest level this year, but is still above the bank’s tolerance level of around 5.5 percent for the current year.
FOOD
McDonald’s expands in China
US fast food giant McDonald’s Corp is planning its biggest expansion yet in China by opening up to 200 new restaurants across the country next year. McDonald’s said it planned to increase its capital spending in China 40 percent next year, but declined to give the value of the planned investment, Dow Jones Newswires reported. The company said it also plans to remodel 80 percent of its existing restaurants, changing the red and yellow decor to a more relaxed, European-style bistro design.
INTERENT
EBay acquires Critical Path
Online auction house eBay on Wednesday announced it has bought mobile gadget application maker Critical Path Software as it follows buyers and sellers onto smartphones and other devices. Critical Path has worked with California-based eBay on applications that let smartphone users connect with the online auction house as well as its other services such as classified ads; ticket marketplace StubHub, and Shopping.com.
Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed.
FINANCE
Lehman payment plan filed
Lehman Brothers Holdings Inc bondholders filed a rival plan with a US bankruptcy court in Manhattan, to parcel out the bank’s estimated US$58 billion in assets in the largest ever US bankruptcy reorganization. Hedge fund Paulson & Co, the California Public Employees’ Retirement System and other bondholders that filed the plan on Wednesday said the reorganization proposal offered by Lehman in March favored large banks. The bondholder plan, would combine the claims and assets of Lehman’s various units and pay creditors from a single pool.
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