ECONOMY
Greece to issue bonds
Greece, at risk of crashing out of the eurozone just two years ago, was to issue its first sovereign bond in almost four years yesterday, seeking to send a strong political and economic signal that it is on the way out of its debt crisis. International banks have been mandated to sell a benchmark five-year, euro-denominated bond under British law, with the sale to be completed “in the immediate future,” the country’s finance ministry said in a statement. According to sources speaking to Reuters and Thomson Reuters news and information service IFR, pricing was set for yesterday. Greece initially priced the sale at a yield of between 5 and 5.25 percent and has already attracted more than 11 billion euros (US$15.21 billion) of investor interest.
CRIME
HP to settle over bribes
HP to Hewlett-Packard (HP) is to pay the US government US$108 million to settle charges that former employees paid bribes to officials in Russia, Mexico and Poland. The US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) said an HP division in Russia paid US$2 million to make sure the company retained a contract with the federal prosecutors’ office there. A Mexican subsidiary paid US$1 million to secure a software sale to the country’s state-owned oil company, while US$600,000 in gifts and bribes were paid to a Polish government official to win contracts with the national police agency. The SEC says each scheme lasted for years, and that HP’s internal controls were not strong enough to stop the illegal payments.
TECHNOLOGY
Facebook moving chats
Facebook on Wednesday began pushing smartphone chats between friends to a stand-alone Messenger application. The move to make members of the world’s leading online social network resort to Messenger for text exchanges on the move comes shortly after Facebook outlined a strategy to focus on specialized “apps” for smartphones and tablets. Messenger was touted as a speedier and superior tool for chats. The switch also lets Facebook focus engineering resources on honing one application instead of dividing resources between two.
REAL ESTATE
Beijing property sold
A company controlled by the family of Asia’s richest man, Li Ka-shing (李嘉誠), has sold a landmark Beijing property for more than US$900 million, it said, adding to speculation he is cashing out of Chinese property. Pacific Century Premium Developments Ltd (盈科大衍地產) — a firm chaired by Richard Li (李澤楷), the tycoon’s younger son — signed an agreement on Tuesday to sell Pacific Century Place for US$928 million. The deal is nearly 30 percent lower than the asking price reported last year for the well-located Beijing property. The deal is the fourth Chinese property disposal by Li’s family since August, it said, adding that the sales have fetched a total of nearly 18 billion yuan (US$2.9 billion).
BANKING
JPMorgan CEO takes pay cut
JPMorgan Chase & Co chairman and CEO Jamie Dimon’s total compensation fell 37 percent last year to US$11.8 million as the largest US investment bank grappled with billions in legal costs and fines. According to regulatory documents filed on Wednesday, Dimon’s total compensation fell from US$18.7 million in 2012. Last year, JPMorgan was hit legal costs and fines stemming from the housing crisis and its US$6 billion “London Whale” trading loss.
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
FUTURE PLANS: Although the electric vehicle market is getting more competitive, Hon Hai would stick to its goal of seizing a 5 percent share globally, Young Liu said Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), a major iPhone assembler and supplier of artificial intelligence (AI) servers powered by Nvidia Corp’s chips, yesterday said it has introduced a rotating chief executive structure as part of the company’s efforts to cultivate future leaders and to enhance corporate governance. The 50-year-old contract electronics maker reported sizable revenue of NT$6.16 trillion (US$189.67 billion) last year. Hon Hai, also known as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團), has been under the control of one man almost since its inception. A rotating CEO system is a rarity among Taiwanese businesses. Hon Hai has given leaders of the company’s six