RETAILERS
Uniqlo, GU users hacked
Fast Retailing Co, Asia’s largest retailer, said hackers might have gained access to the personal information of about half a million users of its Uniqlo and GU brand e-commerce portals. Hackers accessed at least 460,000 accounts registered on Fast Retailing’s Japanese shopping Web sites, the company said on Monday. Users’ personal information, purchase history and parts of credit card numbers might have been accessed, the Tokyo-based retailer said. The hack occurred from April 23 to Friday last week and the company is still investigating.
AUTOMAKERS
Chinese sales slump
Chinese auto sales sank 17.7 percent last month from a year earlier, the 10th straight month of decline amid trade tensions with Washington and an economic slowdown. Drivers in the industry’s biggest global market bought 1.6 million sedans, SUVs and minivans, according to the China Association of Auto Manufacturers. Total vehicle sales fell 14.6 percent to 2 million. Auto sales for the first four months are down 14.7 percent from a year earlier at 6.8 million, the association said.
TELECOMS
Vodafone posts huge loss
British giant Vodafone PLC yesterday announced that it recorded a vast annual loss of 7.6 billion euros (US$8.5 billion), hit by the sale of its Indian assets. “The loss for the financial year of 7.6 billion euros was primarily due to a loss on disposal of Vodafone India [following the completion of the merger with Idea Cellular] and impairments,” Vodafone said in a statement. The loss after tax in Vodafone’s financial year to the end of March contrasted with profit of just under 2.8 billion euros the previous financial year, it said in a statement. Meanwhile, Vodafone announced the sale of its wholly owned New Zealand subsidiary to an investment consortium for NZ$3.4 billion (US$2.2 billion).
NETHERLANDS
Growth beats estimates
Economic growth came in better than economists forecast in the first quarter, adding to a run of good numbers from the eurozone. The first-quarter performance saw the region’s fifth-largest economy grow 0.5 percent compared with the previous three months. That was just ahead of the 0.4 percent median forecast of economists. First-quarter growth was boosted by investment, while net trade subtracted from GDP. From a year earlier, economic growth slowed to 1.7 percent, the weakest since 2015.
INVESTMENTS
Allianz assets hit record
Allianz SE’s giant investment business saw managed assets grow to a record as clients added 18 billion euros in the first quarter, reversing outflows at the end of last year. The new money lifted the amount the company oversees for outside clients to 1.55 trillion euros, Munich-based Allianz said yesterday. Including money overseen for Allianz’s insurance business, the firms now manage a combined 2.1 trillion euros.
INTERNET
Facebook raises wages
Facebook Inc on Monday said that it was raising wages for its US contract workers, such as cafeteria staff and janitors, to a minimum of US$20 per hour in the San Francisco Bay Area, New York and Washington, and to US$18 per hour in Seattle. Facebook last raised minimum wages for contract workers in 2015 to US$15 per hour in its bid to narrow the widening gap between the technology sector’s elite and its lower-paid workers.
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