MINING
BHP results disappoint
Anglo-Australian mining giant BHP Billiton Ltd yesterday reported a lower-than-expected US$3.73 billion half-yearly profit as it warned of a softening Chinese market and growing trade rows. The underlying profit for the six months to Dec. 31 last year was 8 percent lower than the US$4.05 billion recorded in the previous corresponding period, missing market expectations after a series of operational problems at its mines. “It’s a soft result,” Fat Prophets resources analyst David Lennox said, adding that a pullback in commodity prices was also a factor. BHP chief executive Andrew Mackenzie said that a “strong second half is expected to partially offset the impacts from operational outages in the first half.” They included production outages because of a major train derailment at its Western Australia iron ore operations, an outage at its copper mine in South Australia and a fire at a Chilean facility.
BANKING
HSBC warns of uncertainty
HSBC Holdings PLC said that geopolitical uncertainty in China, the US and the UK has made the prognosis for the year far less predictable after fourth-quarter earnings fell short of analysts’ estimates. Chief executive officer John Flint has also vowed to keep a keener eye on costs after a disappointing quarter capped his first year in charge of Europe’s largest bank. Like its rivals, HSBC, which gets most of its business in Asia, was also hit by the meltdown in financial markets, which pushed investment bank revenues lower. Adjusted pretax profit, which excludes one-time items, fell 1 percent to US$3.39 billion in the three months ended Dec. 31 last year, missing the US$4.4 billion consensus average derived from estimates compiled by the bank. Global markets, which houses HSBC’s investment bank, said adjusted revenue was US$1.1 billion, an approximate 16 percent decline from the final three months of 2017.
MEXICO
Banking to be affordable
The government is betting on financial technology to help lift people out of poverty. The administration of President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador has announced measures aimed at making financial services more affordable in a nation where more than half the population is unbanked. It is planning a digital payments system run and built by the central bank that will allow Mexicans to make and receive payments through their smartphones free of charge. A pilot roll out for the platform, known as CoDi, is expected by next month. “In the future, it will no longer be necessary to have a bank in the sense of a traditional, established bank,” Deputy Minister of Finance Arturo Herrera said. “Mobile phones will become banks.”
EUROZONE
ECB signals concern
The European Central Bank’s (ECB) chief economist added to the chorus of policymakers signaling concern on an economic slowdown, saying that officials could push back plans to raise interest rates as a first response against a deeper downturn. “If the euro-area economy were to slow more sharply, we could adapt our forward guidance on interest rates and this could be complemented by other measures,” Peter Praet said in an interview with German newspaper Boersen-Zeitung published late on Monday. “But one thing is clear: The ECB’s Governing Council will always find ways and means of acting if it needs to.”
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
US CONSCULTANT: The US Department of Commerce’s Ursula Burns is a rarely seen US government consultant to be put forward to sit on the board, nominated as an independent director Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), the world’s largest contract chipmaker, yesterday nominated 10 candidates for its new board of directors, including Ursula Burns from the US Department of Commerce. It is rare that TSMC has nominated a US government consultant to sit on its board. Burns was nominated as one of seven independent directors. She is vice chair of the department’s Advisory Council on Supply Chain Competitiveness. Burns is to stand for election at TSMC’s annual shareholders’ meeting on June 4 along with the rest of the candidates. TSMC chairman Mark Liu (劉德音) was not on the list after in December last