E-COMMERCE
Amazon in Flipkart talks
Amazon.com Inc might put in a rival bid to acquire Bangalore-based Flipkart Online Services Pvt even as the Indian e-commerce market leader is in talks with Walmart Inc for a majority stake sale, according to the Mint newspaper. Amazon has held early exploratory discussions to buy Flipkart, the newspaper reported, citing unidentified people. However, it said a deal with Walmart is more likely to go through. The world’s biggest retailer is closing in on acquiring 55 percent of Flipkart through a mix of primary and secondary share purchases that could value the Indian company at US$21 billion, the report said.
AUTOMAKERS
US sales rise by 6.3 percent
US auto sales last month grew 6.3 percent on rising sales of sports utility vehicles (SUV) and pickup trucks. Automakers sold more than 1.6 million vehicles for the month as buyers came out of hibernation after a cold, snowy winter in much of the country. Truck and SUV sales rose 16.3 percent, while car sales plunged 9.2 percent, Autodata Corp said. Nearly two-thirds of all vehicles sold were trucks or SUVs. General Motors Co posted the biggest sales increase at 15.7 percent to 296,138 vehicles and Fiat Chrysler Automobiles NV reported almost a 13.6 percent increase to 216,063 vehicles. Ford Motor Co also saw sales rise 3.5 percent to 243,021 units.
JAPAN
BOJ spends record on funds
It has been a bad year for the Tokyo stock market. Without record purchases by the Bank of Japan (BOJ), it could have been even worse. The central bank spent ¥833 billion (US$7.85 billion) on exchange-traded funds tracking the country’s shares last month, the biggest amount in data stretching back to late in 2010. In the first quarter it also bought more than ever before. The bank stepped in as the market slumped in a global equity rout, deserted by foreign investors, with the benchmark Topix index sinking to its first back-to-back monthly declines since the beginning of 2016.
INSURANCE
Softbank mulls Swiss deal
Swiss reinsurance giant Swiss Re AG yesterday said talks were ongoing with Softbank Group Corp, but that the Japanese group would likely take a stake of no more than 10 percent, much less than earlier expectations. Swiss Re announced that it was in talks the technology investor in February, but had never mentioned the size of the possible stake. Financial news media, including Bloomberg, have cited sources familiar with the talks as saying the Japanese firm could take up to a third of Swiss Re for more than US$10 billion. At current share prices, a 10 percent stake in Swiss Re would be worth about US$3.5 billion.
BANKING
New York Fed selects head
The New York Federal Reserve Bank on Tuesday said that it has selected John Williams to take the helm of the institution that is key to monitoring financial markets and implementing US central bank policy. Williams, who heads the San Francisco Fed and previously served as Former Federal Reserve chair Janet Yellen’s deputy, is to assume the New York position on June 18. He is to replace William Dudley who announced in November last year that he would be retiring a few months early.
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
Stephen Garrett, a 27-year-old graduate student, always thought he would study in China, but first the country’s restrictive COVID-19 policies made it nearly impossible and now he has other concerns. The cost is one deterrent, but Garrett is more worried about restrictions on academic freedom and the personal risk of being stranded in China. He is not alone. Only about 700 American students are studying at Chinese universities, down from a peak of nearly 25,000 a decade ago, while there are nearly 300,000 Chinese students at US schools. Some young Americans are discouraged from investing their time in China by what they see
MAJOR DROP: CEO Tim Cook, who is visiting Hanoi, pledged the firm was committed to Vietnam after its smartphone shipments declined 9.6% annually in the first quarter Apple Inc yesterday said it would increase spending on suppliers in Vietnam, a key production hub, as CEO Tim Cook arrived in the country for a two-day visit. The iPhone maker announced the news in a statement on its Web site, but gave no details of how much it would spend or where the money would go. Cook is expected to meet programmers, content creators and students during his visit, online newspaper VnExpress reported. The visit comes as US President Joe Biden’s administration seeks to ramp up Vietnam’s role in the global tech supply chain to reduce the US’ dependence on China. Images on
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