BONDS
Saudi Arabia raises US$9bn
Saudi Arabia raised US$9 billion in its first global Islamic bond issue, the government announced yesterday, a move analysts said could ease pressure on foreign reserves. The sale of Islamic bonds, known as sukuk, comes after the kingdom in October last year turned to the conventional global debt market for the first time, raising US$17.5 billion in a bond issue. Saudi Arabia has also sold domestic bonds and drawn on its accumulated reserves, all in an effort to reform the economy and address budget deficits caused by a collapse in oil revenues since 2014.
TECHNOLOGY
Apple hires diabetes team
Apple Inc has hired a team of biomedical engineers as part of a secret initiative, initially envisioned by late Apple cofounder Steve Jobs, to develop sensors to treat diabetes, CNBC reported, citing three people familiar with the matter. An Apple spokeswoman declined to comment. The engineers are expected to work at a nondescript office in Palo Alto, California, close to the corporate headquarters, CNBC said.
MACROECONOMICS
Brazil cuts policy rate
Brazil’s central bank on Wednesday cut the key interest rate by 1 percentage point in an accelerating strategy to inject life into the floundering economy. This was the fifth straight cut, taking the key Selic rate to 11.25 percent. “The evidence suggests a gradual resumption of [economic] activity,” the bank said in a statement.
ENERGY
Oil demand to remain slow
The International Energy Agency expects growth in the global demand for crude oil to slow for a second consecutive year this year. The Paris-based agency expects growth of 1.3 million barrels a day this year, compared with the 1.4 million barrels it previously forecast, due to stalled demand in the US, the Middle East, Russia and India. In its monthly report released yesterday, the agency said production would grow this year, even when considering pledges by OPEC members to limit output. The combination of factors could keep a lid on oil prices, which have risen in the past six months after a three-year slump.
SOFTWARE
Infosys boosts payout
Indian software giant Infosys Ltd yesterday pledged to return US$2 billion to shareholders this year as it reported subdued growth in profits for the fourth quarter. The company said that it would raise dividends and share buybacks, with its stock price under pressure due to cuts in businesses’ information-technology budgets and worries over a US visa crackdown under US President Donald Trump. Net profit in the three months to March 31 came in at 36.03 billion rupees (US$557.01 million), only marginally above the 36 billion rupees it reported in the same period last year.
TRANSPORTATION
More departures at Uber
Uber’s head of communications is leaving, the latest in a string of executive departures as the ride-hailing company tries to dig out from a pile of trouble. In a memo to employees, CEO Travis Kalanick called Rachel Whetstone a “force of nature” who “was way ahead of the game when it came to many of the changes we needed to make as a company.” Whetstone, who joined Uber in 2015 after a decade at Google, did not give a reason for her departure. The company is facing accusations of routinely tolerated sexism and sexual harassment in the workplace.
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