FRANCE
No second-quarter growth
Growth stagnated in the second quarter of the year, statistics bureau INSEE reported yesterday, a “disappointing” result that dashed hopes of a small economic expansion. GDP showed no change in the three months to last month, according to a first estimate, after rising a revised 0.7 percent in the first quarter. The Ministry of Finance called the flat figure “disappointing,” given that INSEE had predicted 0.3 percent growth and the Bank of France 0.2 percent. However, the ministry said that it stood by its own growth forecast of 1.5 percent for this year.
SPAIN
GDP grows 0.7 percent
The economy expanded in line with expectations in the second quarter, showing strength even as lawmakers struggle to form a new government after seven months and two elections. GDP grew 0.7 percent in the three months through June, the National Statistics Office said yesterday in a preliminary release. The economy expanded 3.2 percent from a year ago. Acting Minister of the Economy Luis de Guindos has upgraded the nation’s growth forecast to 2.9 percent, from a previous estimate of 2.7 percent, and said he expects unemployment to fall further below 20 percent by the end of the year.
PHARMACEUTICALS
Fosun to buy Gland Pharma
The pharmaceutical arm of Chinese conglomerate Fosun International Ltd (復星國際) plans to buy a majority stake in India’s Gland Pharma Ltd for as much as US$1.26 billion, in what is being touted as the biggest Indian acquisition by a Chinese company. Hong Kong-listed Shanghai Fosun Pharmaceutical Group (復星醫藥) is to take an 86.08 percent stake in the drugmaker if the purchase completes, according to a filing to the Hong Kong stock exchange yesterday. It is still subject to regulatory approvals from authorities in India, the US and China, the filing said.
SMARTPHONES
Microsoft to cut 2,850 jobs
Microsoft Corp said it is cutting 2,850 jobs, about 2.5 percent of its workforce, as it further scales back its troubled smartphone business. A spokeswoman said the layoffs would mostly affect workers in the company’s smartphone hardware operation and related sales teams. She declined to say which geographic locations would be affected, but said many of the laid-off workers had already been notified. The company disclosed the planned job cuts in a regulatory filing, which said they are in addition to 9,250 previous layoffs, primarily affecting the company’s phone business, over the past 12 months.
BANKING
UBS profit down 14%
UBS Group AG reported a 14 percent drop in net profit in the second quarter, citing “pronounced low client activity” amid economic and geopolitical uncertainties and other market weakness. The company said net income fell to 1.03 billion Swiss francs (US$1.05 billion), from SF1.21 billion a year earlier. The latest figures topped an average of analysts’ estimates expecting net income of SF495 million. UBS said operating income fell slightly in its two largest divisions, wealth management and investment banking, while rising slightly in wealth management Americas. The bank said that market volatility, macroeconomic uncertainty and “heightened geopolitical tensions” made worse by Brexit were unlikely to change in the foreseeable future.
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
New apartments in Taiwan’s major cities are getting smaller, while old apartments are increasingly occupied by older people, many of whom live alone, government data showed. The phenomenon has to do with sharpening unaffordable property prices and an aging population, property brokers said. Apartments with one bedroom that are two years old or older have gained a noticeable presence in the nation’s six special municipalities as well as Hsinchu county and city in the past five years, Evertrust Rehouse Co (永慶房產集團) found, citing data from the government’s real-price transaction platform. In Taipei, apartments with one bedroom accounted for 19 percent of deals last
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