BANKING
Meeting to probe LIBOR
Bank of England Governor Mervyn King was to lead a meeting of global central bankers yesterday as they grapple with the collapse in confidence in LIBOR, the benchmark rate for more than US$500 trillion of securities. At least a dozen banks are being probed by regulators worldwide for potentially rigging the London interbank offered rate. King was scheduled for talks with counterparts from the world’s largest economies in Basel, Switzerland, from yesterday. The meeting is held every two months under the auspices of the Bank for International Settlements. King called the gathering in July after Barclays PLC was fined £290 million (US$462 million) for its role in manipulating LIBOR.
EUROPE
Populism summit proposed
Italian Prime Minister Mario Monti on Saturday proposed a special European summit to confront growing populism in the face of the continent’s financial crisis. “We are in a dangerous phase,” Monti said on the sidelines of the Ambrosetti Forum on Lake Como after meeting with EU Council President Herman van Rompuy. He said a divisive populism is present in nearly all eurozone countries and that it aims to divide nations at a moment when the impetus is for greater integration to help safeguard the euro currency and restore health to the EU’s economy. The prime minister offered Rome as a venue for a summit. Van Rompuy said he supported the proposal.
UNIONS
Steelworkers may have pact
The United Steelworkers have announced a tentative agreement on a three-year contract with ArcelorMittal USA covering about 14,000 workers. The union told members on Saturday that they would be getting details soon, as well as dates and locations of informational meetings before a ratification vote. Officials say the current contract, which expired on Sept. 1, would be extended until then. The statement says healthcare for retirees was one of the most important issues, and union officials believe they have negotiated a framework that will protect both current and future retirees. The union says it won wage increases and improved healthcare, rejected management’s calls for two-tier wage and pension systems, and maintained seniority rights and protections against the use of outside contractors.
AVIATION
India gets Dreamliner
Boeing’s 787 Dreamliner landed in New Delhi on Saturday, ending a four-year wait by struggling national carrier Air India to add the next-generation jet to its fleet. The plane, painted in the red and yellow livery of Air India, took 15 hours of flying time from Boeing’s Charleston factory in South Carolina to Delhi, plus a 90-minute stopover at Frankfurt for refueling, said the commander of the aircraft, Captain A.S. Soman. The plane’s arrival — the first of 27 Dreamliners ordered by Air India — was delayed since 2008 because of production problems at Boeing.
VIETNAM
Competitiveness ‘limited’
Vietnam Thuong Tin Commercial Joint-Stock Bank, Western Commercial Joint-Stock Bank and Mekong Development Commercial Joint-Stock Bank have “limited competitiveness,” according to a posting on the government’s Web site. The three banks were placed in the lowest of four groups ranked by competitiveness in a government-backed report written in part by economists from local universities, according to the posting.
Taiwan Transport and Storage Corp (TTS, 台灣通運倉儲) yesterday unveiled its first electric tractor unit — manufactured by Volvo Trucks — in a ceremony in Taipei, and said the unit would soon be used to transport cement produced by Taiwan Cement Corp (TCC, 台灣水泥). Both TTS and TCC belong to TCC International Holdings Ltd (台泥國際集團). With the electric tractor unit, the Taipei-based cement firm would become the first in Taiwan to use electric vehicles to transport construction materials. TTS chairman Koo Kung-yi (辜公怡), Volvo Trucks vice president of sales and marketing Johan Selven, TCC president Roman Cheng (程耀輝) and Taikoo Motors Group
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
RECORD-BREAKING: TSMC’s net profit last quarter beat market expectations by expanding 8.9% and it was the best first-quarter profit in the chipmaker’s history Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), which counts Nvidia Corp as a key customer, yesterday said that artificial intelligence (AI) server chip revenue is set to more than double this year from last year amid rising demand. The chipmaker expects the growth momentum to continue in the next five years with an annual compound growth rate of 50 percent, TSMC chief executive officer C.C. Wei (魏哲家) told investors yesterday. By 2028, AI chips’ contribution to revenue would climb to about 20 percent from a percentage in the low teens, Wei said. “Almost all the AI innovators are working with TSMC to address the
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],”