INDUSTRY
Japan factory production up
Japan’s factory production last month rose a sharper-than-expected 2.7 percent on-month, reversing a drop of 1.9 percent in August, the Japanese Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry said yesterday. The reading beat the median market forecast of a 2.2 percent rise. The rise came after factory output fell a revised 1.9 percent in August, but the ministry remained cautious. A survey of manufacturers released with the data yesterday showed they expected factory production to edge down 0.1 percent on-month this month and pick up 1.0 percent next month.
FINANCE
S Korea surplus grows
South Korea’s current account surplus widened to US$7.6 billion last month as exports grew and spending by Korean travelers overseas fell, state data showed yesterday. The preliminary figure compared with a revised surplus of US$7.2 billion in August, the central Bank of Korea said. The current account — the broadest measure of foreign trade in goods and services — has been in the black for 31 months in a row. The services account, which includes spending on overseas trips, reported a deficit of US$280 million, compared to US$730 million in August and US$200 million a year ago.
BANKING
Q3 loss for Deutsche Bank
Deutsche Bank says it made a net loss of 92 million euros (US$117 million) in the third quarter as legal costs and complying with new regulations weighed on earnings. The loss compares to a profit of 51 million euros in the same period a year ago. Net revenues rose 2 percent to 7.864 billion. The bank said yesterday that set-asides for possible losses from litigation against it had also “materially impacted” its result. The bank also recorded 1.049 billion euros in losses from its non-core operations unit, where it has placed risky assets and investments that it is selling off or winding down to strengthen its overall finances.
GAMING
Strong results for Nintendo
Japanese video game giant Nintendo yesterday said its first-half net profit soared to US$132 million as a sharply weaker yen boosted its bottom line and offset slowing sales. The Kyoto-based company earned ¥14.3 billion (US$132.3 million) between April and last month, way up from ¥600 million in the same period a year ago, despite sales falling 12.8 percent to ¥171.4 billion on lackluster demand for its 3DS games system. Nintendo kept its full-year ¥20 billion profit forecast unchanged and said its operating loss in the first half shrank to ¥215 million, from ¥23.3 billion a year earlier.
ELECTRONICS
LG smartphones boost profit
South Korea’s LG Electronics Inc says its third-quarter profit jumped 87 percent over a year earlier as smartphone sales set a record high. LG Electronics yesterday said its July-to-September net income reached 202.6 billion won (US$193 million) on sales of 14.9 trillion won. Operating income more than doubled from a year earlier to 461.3 billion won. LG said the solid earnings stemmed from the recovery of its handset business. Its profit exceeded that from televisions, LG’s other mainstay business. The company’s smartphone shipments increased 40 percent from a year earlier to a record 16.8 million units, as its flagship G3 smartphone and mid-tier L series smartphone drove sales.
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
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],”
Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 0.7 percent and 13.6 percent respectively from a year earlier, setting record highs for the month of March, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Sales in the wholesale sector also grew last month by 4.6 annually, mainly due to the business opportunities for emerging applications related to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing technologies, the ministry said in a report. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales this month would retain their growth momentum as the former would benefit from Tomb Sweeping Day
Thousands of parents in Singapore are furious after a Cordlife Group Ltd (康盛人生集團), a major operator of cord blood banks in Asia, irreparably damaged their children’s samples through improper handling, with some now pursuing legal action. The ongoing case, one of the worst to hit the largely untested industry, has renewed concerns over companies marketing themselves to anxious parents with mostly unproven assurances. This has implications across the region, given Cordlife’s operations in Hong Kong, Macau, Indonesia, the Philippines and India. The parents paid for years to have their infants’ cord blood stored, with the understanding that the stem cells they contained