European stocks rebounded this week from their worst start to a year since 2010, as European Central Bank (ECB) President Mario Draghi pledged action if money-market turbulence resumes and investors weighed a US jobs report.
Ryanair Holdings PLC added 14 percent after saying more people have booked flights for the summer than at this stage last year, while Sky Deutschland AG rose 14 percent after reporting earnings that beat analysts’ expectations.
Dassault Systemes slumped 8.6 percent after predicting earnings this year would be lower than analysts’ projections.
The STOXX 600 rose 0.8 percent to 325.09 this week. The benchmark gauge has lost 3.3 percent from a six-year high on Jan. 22 amid signs of slowing economic growth in China, reduced stimulus from the US Federal Reserve and as the Argentinian government’s decision to allow the peso to devalue triggered a rout in emerging-market currencies.
“People are still optimistic,” said Craig Erlam, a London-based market analyst at Alpari UK Ltd, a provider of trading services in equities, currencies and commodities.
“Europe is unique right now. Once money starts to pour out of emerging markets, investors will be looking at where to get the best yield, especially in an environment that looks relatively safe,” Erlam said.
US payrolls increased by 113,000 last month, following a revised 75,000 gain in December, US Department of Labor figures showed. The median forecast of economists in a Bloomberg survey called for a 180,000 advance. The jobless rate fell to 6.6 percent, the lowest level since October 2008.
The STOXX 600 jumped 1.5 percent on Thursday, the most since Dec. 19, after the ECB kept its key interest rate at 0.25 percent and Draghi reiterated that the bank would take action if the outlook for inflation worsens or money-market turbulence resumes.
National benchmark indices increased in all 18 Western European markets except Germany this week.
The UK’s FTSE 100 added 0.9 percent, France’s CAC 40 rose 1.5 percent, while Germany’s DAX lost 0.1 percent.
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],”