European stocks posted the biggest weekly retreat in seven months, led by declines in airlines and automakers, as Libya’s violent uprising boosted tension in North Africa and the Middle East, sending oil soaring.
Air France-KLM Group and Deutsche Lufthansa AG, Europe’s largest carriers, fell more than 4 percent amid concern the cost of fuel will rise. Oil companies Eni SpA and OMV AG dropped as the revolts hindered their Libyan operations. Porsche SE sank 14 percent as the sports-car maker said its planned merger with Volkswagen AG will probably be delayed into next year because of German legal obstacles.
The benchmark STOXX Europe 600 Index slumped 2.4 percent this week, the biggest drop since July, as protests against Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi threatened to escalate into civil war.
Demonstrations over the past two months have forced Tunisian president Zine El Abidine Ben Ali to flee the country and unseated Egyptian president Hosni Mubarak.
“Investors were pretty scared,” said Arnaud Scarpaci, a fund manager at Agilis Gestion in Paris, which oversees about US$110 million. “This was the first alert to say that 2011 isn’t going to be a smooth, tranquil river for stocks. The most difficult thing now isn’t to oust Qaddafi, but to put in place a democracy.”
European stocks trimmed their losses for the week on Friday as US consumer confidence rose more than forecast.
The Thomson Reuters/University of Michigan final index of consumer sentiment for last month climbed to 77.5 from 74.2 the prior month. Other releases showed jobless claims fell more than estimated last week and orders for durable goods increased last month.
National benchmark indices fell in all of Europe’s 18 western markets, except Norway and Denmark. France’s CAC 40 Index slid 2.1 percent, the UK’s FTSE 100 retreated 1.3 percent and Germany’s DAX tumbled 3.3 percent.
Technical problems forced a six-and-a-half-hour delay to the start of trading in Italy on Tuesday and a four-hour shutdown of the London Stock Exchange on Friday.
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
FUTURE PLANS: Although the electric vehicle market is getting more competitive, Hon Hai would stick to its goal of seizing a 5 percent share globally, Young Liu said Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), a major iPhone assembler and supplier of artificial intelligence (AI) servers powered by Nvidia Corp’s chips, yesterday said it has introduced a rotating chief executive structure as part of the company’s efforts to cultivate future leaders and to enhance corporate governance. The 50-year-old contract electronics maker reported sizable revenue of NT$6.16 trillion (US$189.67 billion) last year. Hon Hai, also known as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團), has been under the control of one man almost since its inception. A rotating CEO system is a rarity among Taiwanese businesses. Hon Hai has given leaders of the company’s six