Stocks
Saudi bourse may open up
Saudi Arabia is seeking to open its US$509 billion stock exchange to foreign investors in April next year, according to three people briefed on the nation’s plans. Saudi Arabia’s Capital Market Authority informed brokers and fund managers of the plan in London last month, two of the people said, asking not to be identified as the meeting was private. Saudi Arabia is not planning significant changes to draft rules published in August, the people said. The country announced in July that it would open the market in the first half of next year. The world’s biggest oil exporter is removing barriers to one of the world’s most-restricted major stock exchanges as it pursues a US$130 billion spending plan to boost non-energy industries. Opening the market might prompt global index provider MSCI Inc to include the bourse in its emerging market gauge by 2017, attracting as much as US$40 billion to the exchange, Schroders PLC said in July.
germany
Electric car stations to rise
The nation plans to expand its network of charging stations for electric cars countrywide to help boost lackluster demand, a Federal Ministry of Transport and Digital Infrastructure paper seen by reporters showed. Chancellor Angela Merkel’s government wants to bring 1 million battery-powered vehicles onto the roads of Europe’s largest economy by the end of this decade. However, high vehicle prices and drivers’ concerns about infrastructure and limited battery range have held back sales in the nation to just 24,000 models out of a market of about 3 million cars, government data show. The nation only has about 100 quick service charging points for electric cars, and about 4,800 charging stations running on alternating current, according to the ministry.
property
Dubai development surges
Dubai Investments PJSC plans to invest 10 billion dirhams (US$2.7 billion) in real-estate projects in the next five years as it seeks to benefit from resurgent property demand. Developments include Mirdiff Hills, a 2.5 billion dirham project in Dubai that is set to include 1,500 homes, a 230-room hotel, shops and 185,00m2 of office space, Dubai Investments chief executive officer Khalid Bin Kalban said in an interview. The company’s Dubai Investment Real Estate Co unit plans to start tendering for the development in the next two months, he said. Dubai Investments, whose largest shareholder is state-owned Investment Corporation of Dubai, is seeking to profit from a market recovery in the emirate after one of the world’s worst property crashes during the financial crisis in 2008. Local developers are reviving projects amid a surge in prices and new government measures which have helped stabilize the market.
macroeconomics
SYRIZA lays out fiscal policy
A left-wing Greek government would not run deficits, but would pursue fiscal consolidation, the main opposition party’s chief economic policymaker said on Saturday. “Fiscal consolidation? Of course, yes, but in our way, in a way which places the burden on those who can pay,” SYRIZA Party’s Economic Policy Committee chief economist John Milios told reporters. Milios appeared certain Greece is headed for early elections that would result in a stable SYRIZA majority. “No, we are not going to follow a deficit policy. On the other hand, we will not accept, like the present government has agreed, to create an enormous budget surplus, 4.5 percent [of GDP] in 2016.”
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],”