SOUTH KOREA
Growth poised to accelerate
The nation’s growth is poised to accelerate to the fastest since 2010, even as the central bank warned the won’s climb to the highest against the yen in more than five years threatens to damp exporters’ profits. Momentum in Asia’s fourth-biggest economy is picking up, led by improvement in Seoul, and central and southwest areas of the country, the Bank of Korea said in a quarterly Golden Book report released yesterday in Seoul. The yen’s decline against the won is intensifying competition with Japanese companies and may hurt profitability of some exporters, the report said. Authorities were watching for drastic moves in exchange rates, Finance Minister Hyun Oh-seok said this week when the won hit the highest level against the yen since 2008. A housing-price rebound after the worst property-market slowdown since 2004 could support the economy after government and central bank stimulus this year helped to jump start a recovery.
TECHNOLOGY
Sony seeking ‘wig’ patent
Sony Corp, which popularized portable music players with the Walkman, is seeking a US patent for “SmartWig” hairpieces that could help navigate roads, check blood pressure or flip through slides in a presentation. The wig would communicate wirelessly with another device and include tactile feedback, Sony wrote in the filing with the US Patent & Trademark Office. Depending on the model, the hairpiece may include a camera, laser pointer or global positioning system sensor, it said. The development of wearable technology such as eyeglasses, watches and earpieces is expanding as consumers seek new ways to integrate computers into everyday life. The race to gain a foothold in a market that Juniper Research estimates will jump about 14-fold in five years to US$19 billion is luring companies including Sony, Google Inc and Samsung Electronics Co.
RETAIL
Book retailer returns to profit
Book retailer Barnes & Noble returned to a profit in the fiscal second quarter as cost cuts offset lower sales. However, the company’s sales missed expectations. The report comes as the crucial holiday season begins, when retailers can make up to 40 percent of their annual revenue. Barnes & Noble has been evaluating its strategy for its Nook ebook reader after years of investing heavily in the business and developing a color tablet, the Nook HD+, that has faced tough competition from Amazon’s Kindle and the Apple iPad. Things have been in flux since June when chief executive officer William Lynch left the company, which has not named a replacement. It introduced a new non-tablet ebook reader, a US$119 Nook GlowLight, for the holidays.
BANKING
Mortgage costs could grow
The largest US banks could face more payments tied to bad mortgages ranging from US$55 billion to US$105 billion, according to Standard & Poor. Part of the sum is already covered by reserves, S&P said yesterday in a statement introducing a report on legal costs facing US lenders. The expenses will probably not hurt credit ratings, S&P said. The six largest banks have already paid more than US$100 billion to clean up claims that they sold faulty home loans and mortgage-backed bonds to investors and improperly sought to foreclose on homeowners.
Stephen Garrett, a 27-year-old graduate student, always thought he would study in China, but first the country’s restrictive COVID-19 policies made it nearly impossible and now he has other concerns. The cost is one deterrent, but Garrett is more worried about restrictions on academic freedom and the personal risk of being stranded in China. He is not alone. Only about 700 American students are studying at Chinese universities, down from a peak of nearly 25,000 a decade ago, while there are nearly 300,000 Chinese students at US schools. Some young Americans are discouraged from investing their time in China by what they see
MAJOR DROP: CEO Tim Cook, who is visiting Hanoi, pledged the firm was committed to Vietnam after its smartphone shipments declined 9.6% annually in the first quarter Apple Inc yesterday said it would increase spending on suppliers in Vietnam, a key production hub, as CEO Tim Cook arrived in the country for a two-day visit. The iPhone maker announced the news in a statement on its Web site, but gave no details of how much it would spend or where the money would go. Cook is expected to meet programmers, content creators and students during his visit, online newspaper VnExpress reported. The visit comes as US President Joe Biden’s administration seeks to ramp up Vietnam’s role in the global tech supply chain to reduce the US’ dependence on China. Images on
New apartments in Taiwan’s major cities are getting smaller, while old apartments are increasingly occupied by older people, many of whom live alone, government data showed. The phenomenon has to do with sharpening unaffordable property prices and an aging population, property brokers said. Apartments with one bedroom that are two years old or older have gained a noticeable presence in the nation’s six special municipalities as well as Hsinchu county and city in the past five years, Evertrust Rehouse Co (永慶房產集團) found, citing data from the government’s real-price transaction platform. In Taipei, apartments with one bedroom accounted for 19 percent of deals last
US CONSCULTANT: The US Department of Commerce’s Ursula Burns is a rarely seen US government consultant to be put forward to sit on the board, nominated as an independent director Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, yesterday nominated 10 candidates for its new board of directors, including Ursula Burns from the US Department of Commerce. It is rare that TSMC has nominated a US government consultant to sit on its board. Burns was nominated as one of seven independent directors. She is vice chair of the department’s Advisory Council on Supply Chain Competitiveness. Burns is to stand for election at TSMC’s annual shareholders’ meeting on June 4 along with the rest of the candidates. TSMC chairman Mark Liu (劉德音) was not on the list after in December last