AUTOMAKERS
Indian car sales dip 7.4%
India’s car sales slid by more than 7 percent last month, marking a record ninth straight month of decline, industry data showed yesterday, as an economic slump and high borrowing costs discouraged buyers. Carmakers sold 131,163 cars last month, down 7.4 percent from the same month last year, the Society of Indian Automobile Manufacturers said. Meanwhile, sales of motorcycles — a popular means of personal transport — slipped by 1.5 percent to 809,312 units.
TAXes
UK policy confusing: Deloitte
Deloitte UK has called for more consistency from Britain on taxes, the Daily Telegraph said yesterday, quoting the head of the accounting firm. Chief executive and senior partner David Sproul told the daily that a number of companies have put their plans to move to the UK on hold as a result of the mixed messages on taxes from the Treasury and the House of Commons Public Accounts Committee. Britain is initiating proposals aimed at discouraging companies and individuals from using complex schemes — some of which drift over into illegality — to reduce their tax payments, after several multinational firms were shown to be paying little or no taxes in Britain.
BANKING
Deutsche may face caution
Deutsche Bank AG may be told as soon as this month by the German Federal Financial Supervisory Authority (BaFin) to improve its controls to prevent a repeat of attempts to manipulate benchmark interest rates, a person familiar with the matter said. The financial regulator is finalizing its first report into the rigging of Libor and similar benchmarks and will submit it to the Frankfurt-based lender as soon as this month, said the person, who asked not to be identified. BaFin will present its findings to Deutsche Bank management, telling them to adhere to standards set by the regulator, the person said. Barclays PLC, UBS AG and Royal Bank of Scotland Group PLC have paid a total of about US$2.5 billion in fines for colluding to rig benchmark interest rates for profit or to mask their true cost of borrowing.
INTERNET
Hirayama joins Yahoo Japan
Yahoo Japan Corp said Ryu Hirayama, a former banker at Goldman Sachs Group Inc in Tokyo, joined the country’s most-visited Web portal on Aug. 1. The company has not decided on his position, said Junji Miyahara, a spokesman for Yahoo Japan. Hirayama advised on mergers and acquisitions while at Goldman. Yahoo Japan, whose largest shareholder is billionaire Masayoshi Son of Softbank Corp, has announced at least eight mergers and acquisitions worth about US$670 million since April last year, data compiled by Bloomberg showed.
RETAIL
Massmart eyes Kenya
Massmart Holdings Ltd, South Africa’s biggest food and household-goods wholesaler, said it has met “several important players” in Kenya’s retail industry as the unit of Wal-Mart Stores Inc seeks expansion abroad. “Massmart’s interest in investing in Kenya is well-known,” chief executive Grant Pattison said in an e-mailed response to questions. “We don’t, however, comment on acquisitions, potential, speculative or otherwise.” Business Daily, a Nairobi-based newspaper, reported yesterday that among possible targets in Kenya, Massmart’s potential interest triggered a dispute about whether to sell among investors at family-controlled Naivas Supermarket Ltd.
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
ARTIFICIAL INTELLIGENCE: The chipmaker last month raised its capital spending by 28 percent for this year to NT$32 billion from a previous estimate of NT$25 billion Contract chipmaker Powerchip Semiconductor Manufacturing Corp (力積電子) yesterday launched a new 12-inch fab, tapping into advanced chip-on-wafer-on-substrate (CoWoS) packaging technology to support rising demand for artificial intelligence (AI) devices. Powerchip is to offer interposers, one of three parts in CoWoS packaging technology, with shipments scheduled for the second half of this year, Powerchip chairman Frank Huang (黃崇仁) told reporters on the sidelines of a fab inauguration ceremony in the Tongluo Science Park (銅鑼科學園區) in Miaoli County yesterday. “We are working with customers to supply CoWoS-related business, utilizing part of this new fab’s capacity,” Huang said, adding that Powerchip intended to bridge
Microsoft Corp yesterday said that it would create Thailand’s first data center region to boost cloud and artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure, promising AI training to more than 100,000 people to develop tech. Bangkok is a key economic player in Southeast Asia, but it has lagged behind Indonesia and Singapore when it comes to the tech industry. Thailand has an “incredible opportunity to build a digital-first, AI-powered future,” Microsoft chairman and chief executive officer Satya Nadella said at an event in Bangkok. Data center regions are physical locations that store computing infrastructure, allowing secure and reliable access to cloud platforms. The global embrace of AI
Qualcomm Inc, the world’s biggest seller of smartphone processors, gave an upbeat forecast for sales and profit in the current period, suggesting demand for handsets is increasing after a two-year slump. Revenue in the three months ended in June will be US$8.8 billion to US$9.6 billion, the company said in a statement Wednesday. Excluding certain items, earnings will be US$2.15 to US$2.35 a share. Analysts had projected sales of US$9.08 billion and earnings of US$2.16 a share. The outlook signals that the smartphone market has begun to bounce back, tracking with Qualcomm’s forecast that demand would gradually recover this year. The San