FINANCE
UBS Trader jailed for fraud
UBS trader Kweku Adoboli was jailed for seven years on Tuesday for the biggest fraud in British history, which cost the Swiss bank US$2.3 billion. The 32-year-old had admitted trading far in excess of authorized risk limits and booking fictitious trades to hide his true positions, but said everything he did was to make profits for UBS and was in line with the bank’s culture. Tom Naratil, the bank’s chief financial officer, told the court during the trial that Adoboli’s losses had precipitated some job cuts and led to smaller bonuses for remaining staff. UBS has now axed 10,000 jobs and plans to wind down much of its investment bank. It says that is not linked to the Adoboli case, but bank sources say it would not have happened without the management shake-up caused by the rogue trading scandal.
BANKING
Philippine bank eyes deal
Bank of the Philippine Islands is in talks with billionaire Lucio Tan (陳永裁), who controls Philippine National Bank and Allied Banking Corp, on a deal that could create the nation’s largest lender. “We confirm discussions with the Lucio Tan Group,” Bank of the Philippine Islands said in a stock-exchange disclosure. Philippine National confirmed the talks in a separate filing. Shares of both banks were suspended in Manila trading yesterday upon their requests, the stock exchange said. Philippine Daily Inquirer reported yesterday that Bank of the Philippine Islands is in advanced talks to acquire a majority stake in Philippine National Bank. The two banks had a combined market value of 370 billion pesos (US$8.9 million) as of Tuesday.
TECHNOLOGY
Toshiba unveils safety robot
Toshiba Corp’s four-legged robot is designed to help at the meltdown-crippled Japanese nuclear plant, climbing over debris and venturing into radiated areas off-limits to human workers. Tokyo Electric Power Co (TEPCO), the utility that operates the Fukushima Dai-ichi plant, said it was considering using the robot to look at a highly radiated part of the plant called the suppression chamber. Toshiba, which also makes reactors, said it was ready to go if TEPCO said so.
RETAIL
Sales fall in South Korea
Sales at major South Korean department stores declined for a fifth month last month as the slowest economic growth in three years damped sentiment. Outlays at the three biggest chains declined 0.4 percent from a year earlier last month after a 0.8 percent drop in September, the Ministry of Knowledge Economy said yesterday. Discount-store sales declined 6.6 percent last month, the report showed. South Koreans may still wait until after a presidential vote next month and for a budget compromise in the US before spending more, said Lee Sang Jae, a Seoul-based economist at Hyundai Securities Co.
FOOD
Hostess negotiations fail
Hostess Brands Inc, the maker of Twinkies and other snack cakes, said late on Tuesday that it failed to reach an agreement with its second-biggest union. As a result, Hostess was set to continue with a hearing yesterday in which a bankruptcy court judge in White Plains, New York, will decide if the company can shutter its operations. The renewed talks between Hostess and the Bakery, Confectionery, Tobacco Workers and Grain Millers International Union came after the company declared last week that it would move to wind down its business and start selling off its assets in bankruptcy court.
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)