ECONOMY
ECB may cut growth outlook
The European Central Bank (ECB) is likely to lower its growth forecasts for the eurozone, governing council member and Austrian central bank Governor Ewald Nowotny was quoted as saying yesterday. “There won’t be any improvement [in the prognosis], more likely there will be a worsening,” Nowotny was quoted as saying by Dow Jones Newswires on the sidelines of an economic conference in Alpbach, Austria, late on Thursday. The ECB is due to issue its new quarterly forecast at its meeting on Thursday next week.
TRADE
Lamy sees below 4% growth
WTO Director-General Pascal Lamy confirmed on Thursday that growth in global trade would remain below 4 percent this year and urged governments against protectionism. Annual growth in world trade has averaged 6 percent over the past 15 years, but this year “we will be below 4 percent,” Lamy told France’s BFM radio, blaming the slowdown on a sluggish world economy. In April, the WTO warned that global growth would weaken again this year and rise by 5.6 percent next year.
AIRLINES
Lufthansa crews on strike
Lufthansa flight attendants are on strike at Germany’s busiest airport, causing the cancelation of dozens of flights. The cabin crews walked off the job early yesterday morning at Frankfurt airport in an eight-hour strike that is to last until early afternoon. The UFO union says it will continue staging short-term strikes until its demands for better pay and conditions for about 18,000 cabin crew are met. Lufthansa says it has canceled about a quarter of the 360 flights at the airport that were scheduled during the strike hours, all short and middle-distance routes.
TOYS
Girls’ toy lifts Lego profits
Danish toy maker Lego says a new series it created specifically for girls has proved popular despite being criticized for fueling gender stereotypes and has propelled first-half net profits to 2 billion kroner (US$336 million), up 35 percent from the same period last year. The family-owned firm says sales rose 24 percent to 9.1 billion kroner. The company sold twice as many LEGO Friends sets as expected during the first half.
MEDIA
Bertelsmann cautious
German media giant Bertelsmann yesterday issued cautious full-year forecasts despite posting strong profits in the first six months of the year. “The subdued economic prospects and the euro crisis, whose repercussions are challenging to gauge, make it difficult to predict future developments at this time,” Bertelsmann CEO Thomas Rabe said in a statement. In the first six months, Bertelsmann’s net profit jumped 52 percent to 279 million euros (US$349 million) on a 5 percent rise in revenues to 7.572 billion euros.
OIL
Russia is PRC’s top source
Russia is shipping more oil than Iran to China for the first time since at least 2004 after the world’s largest energy user financed a pipeline and field expansion in the former Soviet Union to secure fuel supplies. China, which will account for a third of this year’s global growth in oil demand, boosted imports from Russia by 37 percent in the first seven months of the year, according to the Beijing-based Customs General Administration. Exports from Iran dropped 22 percent in the same period as Tehran’s output slumped and international sanctions took effect.
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
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”
Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 0.7 percent and 13.6 percent respectively from a year earlier, setting record highs for the month of March, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Sales in the wholesale sector also grew last month by 4.6 annually, mainly due to the business opportunities for emerging applications related to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing technologies, the ministry said in a report. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales this month would retain their growth momentum as the former would benefit from Tomb Sweeping Day
Thousands of parents in Singapore are furious after a Cordlife Group Ltd (康盛人生集團), a major operator of cord blood banks in Asia, irreparably damaged their children’s samples through improper handling, with some now pursuing legal action. The ongoing case, one of the worst to hit the largely untested industry, has renewed concerns over companies marketing themselves to anxious parents with mostly unproven assurances. This has implications across the region, given Cordlife’s operations in Hong Kong, Macau, Indonesia, the Philippines and India. The parents paid for years to have their infants’ cord blood stored, with the understanding that the stem cells they contained