TRADE
No taste for Japanese brews
South Korean imports of Japanese beer slumped almost to zero last month in the face of a consumer boycott sparked by a trade and historical dispute between Seoul and Tokyo, Korea Trade Statistics Promotion Institute (KTSPI) data showed yesterday. Japanese companies shipped US$223,000 worth of beer to South Korea last month, down 97 percent from US$7.57 million last year. “Japan’s rank dropped to the 13th place last month,” a KTSPI official said, adding that beers from China, the Netherlands and Belgium now had the biggest shares of the nation’s imports.
RETAIL
H&M’s sales growth slows
Hennes & Mauritz AB’s (H&M) sales growth slowed in the key July and August months, hampering the Swedish giant’s attempt to end a three-year slump in earnings. Sales growth probably slowed down to 6 percent in those two months from 12 percent in June, Berenberg analysts said, based on calculations from figures H&M reported yesterday. Rival Inditex SA this month reported an acceleration in sales, while Primark announced a drop in like-for-like revenue. H&M said its summer collections were well-received and it managed to increase market share.
REAL ESTATE
Singapore sales slump
Private home sales in Singapore slipped 4.8 percent last month even as developers launched more units than the previous month. Developers in the city-state sold 1,122 apartments last month versus 1,179 in July, according to data from the Urban Redevelopment Authority released yesterday. Singapore last month slightly lowered, on average, the charges that developers must pay to enhance the use of certain property sites, or build bigger projects on them. That could have the effect of spurring activity as home builders are incentivized to rejuvenate certain areas.
PHILIPPINES
Online casinos targeted
Secretary of Finance Carlos Dominguez wants the Bureau of Internal Revenue to shut down online gaming operators that have not paid their taxes. Dominguez issued the order on Sunday after finding out that the bureau has not collected most of the 21.6 billion pesos (US$420 million) in income taxes that should have been withheld by online gaming operators. It has issued 130 tax assessments to companies involved in online gaming. The online casinos employ mostly Chinese workers catering to gamblers from the China. Beijing has asked Manila to ban online gaming, but President Rodrigo Duterte has said the country needs the industry.
RETAIL
Sainsbury to sell mortages
Sainsbury is talking with advisers about a sale of its mortgage book, the Telegraph reported on Sunday, as the UK supermarket chain looks for ways to shore up finances after its bid to buy Walmart Inc’s Asda was blocked. Its mortgage business, which amounted to about £1.4 billion (US$1.8 billion) at the end of February, could fetch £1.3 billion if it finds a buyer, but it might struggle to sell its loss-making business because of high costs, the paper said.
TELECOMS
GCX files for bankruptcy
GCX Ltd, a unit of Anil Ambani’s distressed Reliance Communications Ltd, has filed for bankruptcy protection. GCX owns the world’s largest private undersea cable system. The company missed payment on its US$350 million of 7 percent bonds that matured on Aug. 1.
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
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
RECORD-BREAKING: TSMC’s net profit last quarter beat market expectations by expanding 8.9% and it was the best first-quarter profit in the chipmaker’s history Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), which counts Nvidia Corp as a key customer, yesterday said that artificial intelligence (AI) server chip revenue is set to more than double this year from last year amid rising demand. The chipmaker expects the growth momentum to continue in the next five years with an annual compound growth rate of 50 percent, TSMC chief executive officer C.C. Wei (魏哲家) told investors yesterday. By 2028, AI chips’ contribution to revenue would climb to about 20 percent from a percentage in the low teens, Wei said. “Almost all the AI innovators are working with TSMC to address the
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”