European stocks were little changed, with the STOXX Europe 600 Index advancing for a seventh week, as a better-than-expected report on US business activity offset consumer-confidence data that missed forecasts.
Societe Generale SA slipped 2.2 percent after Les Echos reported that the French bank’s Russian unit posted a decline in first-quarter profit. BNP Paribas SA fell 2.4 percent as a person familiar with the matter said US authorities were seeking more than US$10 billion from the bank to settle investigations into dealings with sanctioned countries. Rio Tinto Group and BHP Billiton Ltd slid as a gauge of commodity producers declined the most on the STOXX 600.
The STOXX 600 fell 0.1 percent to 344.24 at the close of trading. The benchmark gauge climbed 0.7 percent this week, capping its longest streak of weekly gains since 2012. It has risen 1.9 percent in May as European Central Bank (ECB) President Mario Draghi pledged to ease monetary policy this month if necessary.
“A generally positive week for global equities has been achieved despite light volumes on limited data,” said Richard Hunter, head of equities at Hargreaves Lansdown PLC in London. “Investors have been searching for the next direct catalyst, but in the meantime have been lightened by an improving US economy and, in particular, on hopes that next week will herald some fresh monetary stimulus from the European Central Bank.”
Draghi said this month he’s “comfortable” to act this month June to expand the central bank’s easing policy. The bank is to announce its monetary policy decision on Thursday. ECB Executive Board member Yves Mersch said in Tokyo on Wednesday that the central bank was working on a package of measures to fuel price growth and stimulate the economy, which could include a negative deposit rate for the first time.
US consumer confidence fell last month more than forecast.
The Thomson Reuters/University of Michigan final index of sentiment dropped to 81.9 last month from 84.1 in April. The median projection in a Bloomberg survey of economists called for 82.5 after an initial reading last month of 81.8.
National benchmark indices declined in eight of 17 western European markets trading on Friday. Copenhagen’s bourse was closed for a holiday. France’s CAC 40 fell 0.2 percent, Germany’s DAX added less than 0.1 percent,and the UK’s FTSE 100 dropped 0.4 percent.
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
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
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)
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