European stocks posted a second weekly gain as companies from Swatch Group AG to -Alcatel--Lucent SA reported -better-than-expected earnings and after Egypt’s president stepped down.
Swatch climbed 8.5 percent, while Alcatel surged 35 percent. ArcelorMittal advanced after forecasting a stronger year ahead as demand recovers. Nokia Oyj, the world’s biggest maker of mobile phones, dropped 14 percent after saying it will form a software partnership with Microsoft Corp.
The STOXX 600 Europe Index gained 0.7 percent to 287.99. The gauge reached the highest level since 2008 earlier this week, pushing the measure to about 16 times the reported earnings of its companies, near the highest level in nine months, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
“Earnings have been reassuring,” said Guillaume Duchesne, equity strategist at BGL BNP Paribas in Luxembourg. “There have been positive surprises. Sales have progressed. Our vision of the market is positive, without being euphoric.”
Stocks rallied on Friday after a statement on state television said Egyptian President Hosni Mubarak would resign. Earlier, Egyptians streamed out of Friday prayers vowing to topple Mubarak after he defied calls for his resignation for the second time this month.
“There is one less element of uncertainty for the market,” Duchesne said. “Now, we have to see what happens.”
China earlier this week raised its key interest rates for the third time since mid-October.
“If there is a significant monetary tightening in China, that could slow down the economy,” said Benoit de Broissia, an analyst at KBL Richelieu in Paris, which oversees US$4.1 billion. “That would be negative for those companies exposed to the economy. Today, our economies are more and more interdependent.”
National benchmark indices rose in 13 of Europe’s 18 western markets. France’s CAC 40 Index gained 1.3 percent, the UK’s FTSE 100 Index rose 1.1 percent, while Germany’s DAX Index advanced 2.2 percent.
Taiwan Transport and Storage Corp (TTS, 台灣通運倉儲) yesterday unveiled its first electric tractor unit — manufactured by Volvo Trucks — in a ceremony in Taipei, and said the unit would soon be used to transport cement produced by Taiwan Cement Corp (TCC, 台灣水泥). Both TTS and TCC belong to TCC International Holdings Ltd (台泥國際集團). With the electric tractor unit, the Taipei-based cement firm would become the first in Taiwan to use electric vehicles to transport construction materials. TTS chairman Koo Kung-yi (辜公怡), Volvo Trucks vice president of sales and marketing Johan Selven, TCC president Roman Cheng (程耀輝) and Taikoo Motors Group
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
RECORD-BREAKING: TSMC’s net profit last quarter beat market expectations by expanding 8.9% and it was the best first-quarter profit in the chipmaker’s history Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), which counts Nvidia Corp as a key customer, yesterday said that artificial intelligence (AI) server chip revenue is set to more than double this year from last year amid rising demand. The chipmaker expects the growth momentum to continue in the next five years with an annual compound growth rate of 50 percent, TSMC chief executive officer C.C. Wei (魏哲家) told investors yesterday. By 2028, AI chips’ contribution to revenue would climb to about 20 percent from a percentage in the low teens, Wei said. “Almost all the AI innovators are working with TSMC to address the
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],”