SINGAPORE
Exports down 1.8 percent
Exports unexpectedly fell last month as manufacturers shipped fewer electronics goods and sales to customers in the US and Hong Kong declined. Outbound shipments dropped 1.8 percent from a year earlier, after a revised 9.9 percent gain in March, the trade promotion agency said in a statement yesterday. The median estimate of 13 economists surveyed by Bloomberg News was for an increase of 7.9 percent. For the full year, the government expects exports to rise at about a third of the pace last year, when overseas shipments jumped the most since 2003.
RETAIL
H&M sales rise 21 percent
Hennes & Mauritz AB, the world’s second-largest clothing retailer, reported its strongest sales growth in eight months as an unusually warm April across northern Europe encouraged shoppers to buy summer fashions. Total sales last month gained 21 percent, Stockholm-based H&M said in a statement yesterday, the biggest advance since August. Revenue at stores open at least a year rose 11 percent. The median estimate in an SME Direkt poll of analysts was for total sales to rise 18 percent and comparable sales to gain 9 percent. Temperatures rose above the seasonal average in countries such as the UK last month, causing shoppers to bring forward purchases of summer clothing. Next PLC, the UK’s second-largest fashion retailer, also said this month purchases were boosted by the warm weather. A later Easter holiday this year further helped H&M’s sales, according to analysts including Richard Chamberlain at Bank of America Merrill Lynch.
AUTOMOBILES
Saab gets China funding
Saab and its Dutch owner Spyker yesterday announced new rescue funding through a venture with Chinese firm Pang Da Automobile (龐大汽車), just days after another Chinese rescue deal collapsed. Spyker described Pang Da as “China’s largest publicly traded automobile distributor with over 1,100 dealerships nationwide.” Spyker said that under a draft agreement covering manufacturing and distribution, Pang Da Automobile would inject 65 million euros (US$92 million) into Spyker in exchange for 24 percent of the company. The cash “will secure Saab automobile’s medium-term funding,” Spyker said in a statement. Pang Da will initially transfer 30 million euros to purchase Saab cars and another 15 million euros to purchase more vehicles within 30 days of the initial purchase.
EQUITIES
LSE committed to TMX
The London Stock Exchange remains committed to a merger with its Toronto counterpart, it said yesterday, after a Canadian consortium launched an informal takeover bid that could derail the deal. “London Stock Exchange Group (LSEG) remains committed to its recommended merger with TMX,” it said in a statement, adding that TMX has informed the group of the takeover approach. In February, the LSE Group had launched a merger with TMX, operator of the Toronto Stock Exchange. The deal is due to be completed in the autumn, pending regulatory and shareholder approvals. However, over the weekend, TMX revealed that it has received an informal approach from Maple Group Acquisition Corp, which is a grouping of Canadian financial institutions and pension funds. Maple’s offer values TMX at about C$3.58 billion (US$3.69 billion), according to various media reports.
WASHINGTON’S INCENTIVES: The CHIPS Act set aside US$39 billion in direct grants to persuade the world’s top semiconductor companies to make chips on US soil The US plans to award more than US$6 billion to Samsung Electronics Co, helping the chipmaker expand beyond a project in Texas it has already announced, people familiar with the matter said. The money from the 2022 CHIPS and Science Act would be one of several major awards that the US Department of Commerce is expected to announce in the coming weeks, including a grant of more than US$5 billion to Samsung’s rival, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), people familiar with the plans said. The people spoke on condition of anonymity in advance of the official announcements. The federal funding for
HIGH DEMAND: The firm has strong capabilities of providing key components including liquid cooling technology needed for AI servers, chairman Young Liu said Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) yesterday revised its revenue outlook for this year to “significant” growth from a “neutral” view forecast five months ago, due to strong demand for artificial intelligence (AI) servers from cloud service providers. Hon Hai, a major assembler of iPhones that is also known as Foxconn, expects AI server revenues to soar more than 40 percent annually this year, chairman Young Liu (劉揚偉) told investors. The robust growth would uplift revenue contribution from AI servers to 40 percent of the company’s overall server revenue this year, from 30 percent last year, Liu said. In the three-year period
LONG HAUL: Largan Energy Materials’ TNO-based lithium-ion batteries are expected to charge in five minutes and last about 20 years, far surpassing conventional technology Largan Precision Co (大立光) has formed a joint venture with the Industrial Technology Research Institute (ITRI, 工研院) to produce fast-charging, long-life lithium-ion batteries for electric vehicles, mobile electronics and electric storage units, the camera lens supplier for Apple Inc’s iPhones said yesterday. Largan Energy Materials Co (萬溢能源材料), established in January, is developing high-energy, fast-charging, long-life lithium-ion batteries using titanium niobium oxide (TNO) anodes, it said. TNO-based batteries can be fully charged in five minutes and have a lifespan of 20 years, a major advantage over the two to four hours of charging time needed for conventional graphite-anode-based batteries, Largan said in a
Taiwan is one of the first countries to benefit from the artificial intelligence (AI) boom, but because that is largely down to a single company it also represents a risk, former Google Taiwan managing director Chien Lee-feng (簡立峰) said at an AI forum in Taipei yesterday. Speaking at the forum on how generative AI can generate possibilities for all walks of life, Chien said Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) — currently among the world’s 10 most-valuable companies due to continued optimism about AI — ensures Taiwan is one of the economies to benefit most from AI. “This is because AI is