INDIA
Economy expected to rise
Economic growth is expected to accelerate this year and could reach nearly 6 percent, a key government study said yesterday ahead of the first national budget by the new right-wing government. The India Economic Survey, prepared by the Ministry of Finance, predicted growth would be in the 5.4 to 5.9 percent range in the financial year to March 31 next year, up from 4.7 percent in the previous 12 months.
CHINA
Annual inflation slows
Annual inflation slowed to 2.3 percent last month from a four-month high of 2.5 percent in May, official data showed yesterday. The country’s consumer price index — a main gauge of inflation — also rose by 2.3 percent in the first six months of the year from the same period last year, the National Bureau of Statistics said in a statement. Food was the main driver of inflation, according to the bureau’s data, with fruit prices up 19.8 percent last month from the year before.
BANKING
Citigroup close to settlement
Citigroup Inc is close to a deal to pay more than US$4 billion to settle allegations it fraudulently marketed mortgage bonds ahead of the financial crisis, the Wall Street Journal said on Tuesday. The Journal said the bank is finalizing a deal with the US Justice Department that will fall somewhere between the US$4 billion the bank had offered and the US$10 billion demanded by the US government. The Journal said a settlement could now be announced as early as next week, citing people familiar with the case.
ENTERTAINMENT
Sydney casino given nod
Australian mogul James Packer’s A$1.5 billion (US$1.4 billion) Sydney casino has been given the green light by the New South Wales State gaming regulator, taking it one step closer to winning final approval. Billionaire Packer, who runs Crown — a worldwide gambling empire already operating casinos in Melbourne, Perth and Macau — won backing from the Independent Liquor and Gaming Authority on Tuesday. The state body said in a statement that the casino would be awarded a 99-year gaming license and could start operating from November 15, 2019.
TELECOMS
Movil to divest assets
Telecom company America Movil says it will divest some assets to reduce its market share in the face of Mexico’s telecommunications reform designed to break up monopolies. Magnate Carlos Slim’s company said on Tuesday its board has agreed to sell enough assets to put the company at less than 50 percent of the market. America Movil controls about 70 percent of the mobile and about 80 percent of fixed telephone markets in Mexico.
TRANSPORTATION
Uber drops New York prices
Car-hailing service Uber is taking on New York City’s taxis, temporarily dropping some of its prices by 20 percent. The company says the price of its UberX lower-end service is now cheaper than the rate charged by the city’s famous yellow cabs. The sale in the nation’s largest city — one heavily dependent on taxis — comes following similar temporary reductions in the past month in Atlanta, Boston, Washington, Los Angeles, Chicago and San Francisco. Uber says if the reduced fares attract more passengers, it is more likely to keep the prices low.
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
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
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