JAPAN
Industrial output shrinks
Industrial output shriveled last month, figures showed yesterday, as flooding in Thailand added to woes for companies already battling a strong yen and the global economic chill. Factory production dropped 2.6 percent month-on-month, worse than market expectations of a 0.7 percent fall, government data showed. A separate economic report showed yesterday that the nation remained mired in deflation, with its core consumer prices falling 0.2 percent last month from a year earlier. The reading was in line with market expectations. The core consumer price index edged down 0.1 percent in October.
UNITED STATES
Consumer confidence up
Improving labor market conditions lifted US consumer confidence to an eight-month high this month, as a report by the Conference Board on Tuesday showed the index of consumer confidence rose to 64.5 this month from 55.2 last month, beating economists’ expectations for a reading of 58.3. However, a separate report from Standard & Poor’s/Case-Shiller showed house prices in 20 major metropolitan areas declined 1.2 percent on an unadjusted basis in October after falling 0.7 percent the prior month, indicating that persistently weak house prices remain an obstacle to faster economic growth.
EQUITIES
Carlyle returns US$15bn
Carlyle Group LP, the Washington-based private-equity firm planning to go public next year, returned US$15 billion to its limited partners during the first three quarters of this year, the most the firm has ever distributed over a nine-month period, according to an investor. The amount includes equity plus gains on the capital, said the investor, who asked not to be identified because the information is private. Carlyle deployed US$8.2 billion of capital in the first three quarters, the investor said. Carlyle’s distribution tops the US$5.6 billion New York rival KKR & Co returned to investors in the same period.
INSURANCE
MetLife to sell unit to GE
MetLife said on Tuesday it plans to sell its US retail deposit business to GE Capital as it moves away from being a bank holding company. Financial terms were not disclosed. MetLife Inc, which offers insurance and employee benefit programs, said in July it was exploring the sale of its banking operations to focus on its other business. GE Capital’s banking business, GE Capital Financial, would acquire US$7.5 billion in deposits. About US$3 billion in other deposits would be transferred in the next six months. GE Capital says the deal fits its plans to launch a US deposit platform.
MEDIA
New York Times to sell unit
The New York Times Co said on Tuesday that it would sell its group of 16 small, regional newspapers to Halifax Media Holdings LLC for US$143 million. “The sale of our Regional Media Group will enable The New York Times Company to continue our transformation to a digitally focused, multiplatform media company,” New York Times Co chairman Arthur Sulzberger said. Last year, the group accounted for 11 percent of The New York Times Co’s US$2.4 billion in annual revenue, according to the company’s annual report. The sale is expected to close in a few weeks and The New York Times Co will record an after-tax gain on the sale in the first quarter of next year. It estimates that the net after-tax proceeds from the sale will be about US$150 million, which it plans to use for general corporate purposes.
DECOUPLING? In a sign of deeper US-China technology decoupling, Apple has held initial talks about using Baidu’s generative AI technology in its iPhones, the Wall Street Journal said China has introduced guidelines to phase out US microprocessors from Intel Corp and Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD) from government PCs and servers, the Financial Times reported yesterday. The procurement guidance also seeks to sideline Microsoft Corp’s Windows operating system and foreign-made database software in favor of domestic options, the report said. Chinese officials have begun following the guidelines, which were unveiled in December last year, the report said. They order government agencies above the township level to include criteria requiring “safe and reliable” processors and operating systems when making purchases, the newspaper said. The US has been aiming to boost domestic semiconductor
Nvidia Corp earned its US$2.2 trillion market cap by producing artificial intelligence (AI) chips that have become the lifeblood powering the new era of generative AI developers from start-ups to Microsoft Corp, OpenAI and Google parent Alphabet Inc. Almost as important to its hardware is the company’s nearly 20 years’ worth of computer code, which helps make competition with the company nearly impossible. More than 4 million global developers rely on Nvidia’s CUDA software platform to build AI and other apps. Now a coalition of tech companies that includes Qualcomm Inc, Google and Intel Corp plans to loosen Nvidia’s chokehold by going
ENERGY IMPACT: The electricity rate hike is expected to add about NT$4 billion to TSMC’s electricity bill a year and cut its annual earnings per share by about NT$0.154 Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) has left its long-term gross margin target unchanged despite the government deciding on Friday to raise electricity rates. One of the heaviest power consuming manufacturers in Taiwan, TSMC said it always respects the government’s energy policy and would continue to operate its fabs by making efforts in energy conservation. The chipmaker said it has left a long-term goal of more than 53 percent in gross margin unchanged. The Ministry of Economic Affairs concluded a power rate evaluation meeting on Friday, announcing electricity tariffs would go up by 11 percent on average to about NT$3.4518 per kilowatt-hour (kWh)
OPENING ADDRESS: The CEO is to give a speech on the future of high-performance computing and artificial intelligence at the trade show’s opening on June 3, TAITRA said Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD) chairperson and chief executive officer Lisa Su (蘇姿丰) is to deliver the opening keynote speech at Computex Taipei this year, the event’s organizer said in a statement yesterday. Su is to give a speech on the future of high-performance computing (HPC) in the artificial intelligence (AI) era to open Computex, one of the world’s largest computer and technology trade events, at 9:30am on June 3, the Taiwan External Trade Development Council (TAITRA) said. Su is to explore how AMD and the company’s strategic technology partners are pushing the limits of AI and HPC, from data centers to