CHINA
FDI slows down
Foreign direct investment fell last month for the fifth consecutive month, official figures showed yesterday, as Europe struggled with its debt crisis and economic weakness. Investment from overseas fell 6.1 percent last month from a year earlier to US$11.8 billion, the commerce ministry said. In the first three months of the year, FDI reached US$29.48 billion, down 2.8 percent from the same period last year. Investment from the EU tumbled 31.2 percent year-on-year to US$1.4 billion in the January-March period, while investment from the US rose 10.1 percent in the first quarter to reach US$893 million, the ministry said.
RETAIL
Marks & Spencer sales up
British clothing-to-food retailer Marks & Spencer said yesterday that sales edged higher in the group’s fourth quarter despite challenging conditions. Group sales increased by 0.8 percent in the 13 weeks to the end of last month, compared with the equivalent period of last year, the company said in a statement. Sales at its stores in Britain advanced by 1.2 percent in the group’s fourth quarter. However, they fell by 0.7 percent on a like-for-like basis, which strips out the effect of new floor space.
LUXURY GOODS
Burberry meets forecasts
British luxury brand Burberry Group PLC met forecasts with an 18 percent rise in second-half sales, driven by strong sales in Britain, France and China, and said it was positive on the year ahead. The 156-year-old seller of raincoats and leather goods yesterday reported total revenues of £1.027 billion (US$1.63 billion) for the six months to the end of last month, in line with analysts’ average forecast of £1.03 billion in a Reuters poll. The company said retail revenues, which now account for 72 percent of group sales, rose almost a quarter to £743 million and that the outlook was good. Wholesale and licensing sales rose 7 percent and 5 percent in the second half respectively.
BANKING
Citigroup reports profit
Citigroup is reporting a profit of US$2.9 billion for the first three months of the year. The bank says it collected record revenue from processing international transactions by other companies. It was hurt by an accounting charge of US$1.3 billion as the value of its debt increased. The bank says it earned US$0.95 a share in the first quarter, falling short of estimates of US$1.01 per share from analysts surveyed by FactSet. As more of its customers paid back their loans on time, the bank was able to take a profit of US$1.2 billion from the reserves it had set aside for losses. Citi’s stock is up US$0.14 to US$33.55 in pre-market trading.
TELECOMS
Nokia downgraded
Moody’s ratings agency downgraded Nokia’s debt grade to near junk status on Monday, citing a sharp decline in first-quarter cellphone sales that led to a 35 percent fall in revenue. The agency lowered Nokia’s long-term credit rating by one notch to “Baa3” — just a step above non-investment grade — following last week’s profit warning, which had caused Nokia’s shares to plunge by more than 20 percent. It left a negative outlook on the ratings, meaning it could downgrade Nokia to junk status if the new smartphones don’t sell well and revenue fails to recover later this year.
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
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
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)