COMPUTERS
IBM income jumps 7%
Information technology giant IBM said on Thursday that its net income jumped 7 percent last year, driven by surging business in dynamic emerging economies. Net income for the year hit US$15.9 billion on revenues of US$106.9 billion, also up 7 percent for the year. Earnings per share (EPS) rose 13 percent to US$13.06, the ninth straight year EPS scored double-digit growth, the company said. The company said revenues in the BRIC countries — Brazil, Russia, India and China — increased 10 percent.
RETAIL
IKEA profits up 10.3%
IKEA says its profit jumped 10.3 percent last year as the Swedish furniture retailer increased sales despite economic uncertainty in some of its key markets. IKEA said yesterday it made a net profit of 2.97 billion euros (US$3.81 billion) in the year ended Aug. 31, while revenue grew 6.9 percent to 25.17 billion euros. CEO Mikael Ohlsson said IKEA is examining the details of recent legislation that will open up India to foreign companies and allow large single-brand retailers to own 100 percent of their stores there.
CREDIT
American Express income up
American Express Co, the biggest credit-card issuer by purchases, reported a 12 percent increase in fourth-quarter net income as card spending reached a record. Net income was US$1.19 billion, or US$1.01 a share, compared with US$1.06 billion, or US$0.88, a year earlier, the New York-based lender said on Thursday. “Cardmembers spent a record amount on their American Express cards, continuing a trend that has translated into overall share gains during the last two years,” CEO Kenneth Chenault said in the statement. “The overall recovery in the US remains uneven and the environment in Europe continues to pose challenges for the global economy.”
AUSTRIA
Fifty-year bonds issued
Austria has issued 50-year bonds for the first time in its history, the federal financing agency said on Thursday. The offering raised 2 billion euros (US$2.58 billion) with the yield at 3.837 percent, slightly higher than the 3.434 percent rate for 3 billion euros’ of 10-year bonds issued the same day, the state agency said. The move comes after Austria last week lost its cherished “AAA” rating from Standard & Poor’s, although it retains the top credit rank with fellow rating agencies Fitch and Moody’s.
PHARMACEUTICALS
Merck pays up over Vioxx
Pharmaceutical giant Merck said on Thursday it has agreed to pay up to C$36.8 million (US$36.3 million) to resolve all suits brought against it in Canada over its former hit painkiller Vioxx. Merck voluntarily withdrew the popular medicine, known by its generic name Rofecoxib, from the market in 2004 after interim clinical trials linked the drug to a higher risk of heart attacks and stroke. Since then Merck has faced numerous lawsuits over the medicine from customers.
AUTOMAKERS
Ford workers get bonuses
Ford is giving pay raises and bonuses to about 20,000 workers, mainly in the US and Canada. Letters sent to workers last week say they will get 2.7 percent raises on April 1. They will also get bonuses based on performance. Spokeswoman Marcey Evans says the raises are needed to keep pay competitive with other Fortune 100 companies. Ford Motor Co made US$6.6 billion in the first three quarters of last year.
BUSINESS UPDATE: The iPhone assembler said operations outlook is expected to show quarter-on-quarter and year-on-year growth for the second quarter Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) yesterday reported strong growth in sales last month, potentially raising expectations for iPhone sales while artificial intelligence (AI)-related business booms. The company, which assembles the majority of Apple Inc’s smartphones, reported a 19.03 percent rise in monthly sales to NT$510.9 billion (US$15.78 billion), from NT$429.22 billion in the same period last year. On a monthly basis, sales rose 14.16 percent, it said. The company in a statement said that last month’s revenue was a record-breaking April performance. Hon Hai, known also as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團), assembles most iPhones, but the company is diversifying its business to
Apple Inc has been developing a homegrown chip to run artificial intelligence (AI) tools in data centers, although it is unclear if the semiconductor would ever be deployed, the Wall Street Journal reported on Monday. The effort would build on Apple’s previous efforts to make in-house chips, which run in its iPhones, Macs and other devices, according to the Journal, which cited unidentified people familiar with the matter. The server project is code-named ACDC (Apple Chips in Data Center) within the company, aiming to utilize Apple’s expertise in chip design for the company’s server infrastructure, the newspaper said. While this initiative has been
GlobalWafers Co (環球晶圓), the world’s No. 3 silicon wafer supplier, yesterday said that revenue would rise moderately in the second half of this year, driven primarily by robust demand for advanced wafers used in high-bandwidth memory (HBM) chips, a key component of artificial intelligence (AI) technology. “The first quarter is the lowest point of this cycle. The second half will be better than the first for the whole semiconductor industry and for GlobalWafers,” chairwoman Doris Hsu (徐秀蘭) said during an online investors’ conference. “HBM would definitely be the key growth driver in the second half,” Hsu said. “That is our big hope
The consumer price index (CPI) last month eased to 1.95 percent, below the central bank’s 2 percent target, as food and entertainment cost increases decelerated, helped by stable egg prices, the Directorate-General of Budget, Accounting and Statistics (DGBAS) said yesterday. The slowdown bucked predictions by policymakers and academics that inflationary pressures would build up following double-digit electricity rate hikes on April 1. “The latest CPI data came after the cost of eating out and rent grew moderately amid mixed international raw material prices,” DGBAS official Tsao Chih-hung (曹志弘) told a news conference in Taipei. The central bank in March raised interest rates by