JAPAN
Exports expand 7.5 percent
Exports last month expanded for a fifth consecutive month, with shipments to China surging as global demand continued to support the nation’s economic recovery. Exports rose 7.5 percent from a year earlier, according to data released by the Ministry of Finance, while imports jumped 15.1 percent. The trade surplus was ¥481.7 billion (US$4.32 billion). Exports have driven five consecutive quarters of growth in the nation’s economy, the longest run in a decade. Imports have also picked up, notching the biggest gain in more than three years in March. The swell in trade indicates an increasingly healthy global economy. However, the outlook for global trade remains unclear after G7 finance chiefs agreed only on watered-down language about avoiding protectionism at their meeting the month in Italy.
CHEMICALS
Clariant to buy Huntsman
Clariant AG agreed to buy Huntsman Corp for about US$6.4 billion in an all-stock deal valuing the US company at about the same price, extending a record run in transactions in the global chemicals industry. Huntsman holders are to get 1.2196 shares in the new company, to be called HuntsmanClariant, for each share they own, with Clariant emerging with a 52 percent stake, the two companies said in a statement yesterday. The combination is expected to generate more than US$400 million in annual cost savings, leading to US$3.5 billion in value creation, they said.
AIRLINES
Peach to accept Bitcoin
Peach Aviation Ltd is to become the first Japanese carrier to accept bitcoin as payment for tickets as the discount airline aims to attract more tourists from other parts of Asia. The cryptocurrency can be used to book seats starting by the end of the year, Peach said yesterday in a statement, adding that a change last month in Japan’s law on fund settlements helped facilitate the move. The carrier also aims to increase tie-ups with local governments and regional companies to help spread usage of the currency, it said. Latvian airline airBaltic announced almost three years ago that it would start accepting payment using bitcoin. The electronic currency surged as much as 13 percent to a record US$2,187.78 yesterday, and is trading about 70 percent above the price of an ounce of gold, according to data compiled by Bloomberg.
AVIATION
Panel to investigate Airbus
Airbus has appointed an independent panel, including two former ministers, to examine its anti-corruption practices after Britain and France launched fraud and bribery investigations into the sale of jetliners. Europe’s largest aerospace group yesterday said that the three advisers, who include former German minister of finance Theo Waigel and former French minister of European affairs Noelle Lenoir, are to report to Airbus chief executive officer Tom Enders and the board. Airbus is in the midst of an upheaval after acknowledging discrepancies in past applications for British financial support to sell passenger jets. The company’s self-disclosure of “misstatements and omissions” regarding the use of middlemen to help win contracts prompted Britain’s Serious Fraud Office to launch a bribery and fraud investigation last year. France opened a similar investigation in March and authorities in the two nations have said they will cooperate in the inquiries, the most far-reaching to target the 47-year-old company’s civil activities.
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