SOUTH KOREA
Inflation tumbles to 0.4%
Inflation last year came in at 0.4 percent, the weakest since data going back to 1966, as uncertainties from a trade war and a slowdown in the global tech cycle hit consumer demand. Last month, consumer prices rose 0.7 percent from a year earlier, Statistics Korea data showed. That compared with the median estimate of a 0.6 percent rise in a Bloomberg survey of economists and a 0.2 percent gain in November. The nation’s economy was expected to grow 1.9 percent last year, the slowest pace in a decade, economists surveyed by Bloomberg said. The Bank of Korea has said that it expects inflation to pick up gradually to 1 percent this year.
SINGAPORE
Nonresident deposits rise
Deposits by nonresidents in local banks in November rose 2.6 percent to S$51.1 billion (US$38 billion), the eighth consecutive month of gains, Monetary Authority of Singapore data showed. The uptick from a month earlier could reflect continued inflows from Hong Kong amid political tensions in the former British colony. Nonresident deposits have been rising steadily since March last year, the data showed. Nonresident deposits made up 7.5 percent of total deposits by nonbank customers of S$682.7 billion in November, up slightly from 7.35 percent of the total in the prior month.
UNITED KINGDOM
Pay raises planned for April
The government is to give a pay raise to the lowest earners this year as it seeks to deliver on its election promise to raise living standards as the country leaves the EU. Chancellor of the Exchequer Sajid Javid said that the minimum wage would increase by 6.2 percent from April 1, in line with the recommendation of the independent Low Pay Commission, the Treasury said in a statement. Javid in September last year announced that the mandatory national living wage would rise to £10.50 (US$13.79) an hour over five years, up from £8.21. The first phase of that would see 2.8 million people aged at least 25 get a pay raise to £8.72 from April.
RETAIL
NWP Retail to buy five malls
NWP Retail, a shopping mall developer backed by Warburg Pincus LLC, is to spend US$123.5 million buying five Lippo Group (力寶集團) shopping malls in Indonesia. Two shopping malls are to be acquired from the Indonesian units of Singapore-listed Lippo Malls Indonesia Retail Trust for US$92 million, while another three would be bought for US$31.5 million from entities owned by PT Multipolar. The acquisitions represent “a milestone in NWP Retail’s rapid expansion,” CEO Timothy Daly said in a statement yesterday. “It will strengthen the company’s presence across key markets in tier-one and tier-two cities in Indonesia.”
TURKEY
EBRD sells stake in bourse
The sovereign wealth fund yesterday said in an e-mailed statement that it has acquired a 10 percent stake in the nation’s bourse from the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD). The acquisition brings its stake in Borsa Istanbul to 90.6 percent, the fund said. The deal puts an end to the EBRD’s investment in the bourse, which started at the end of 2015. In October, the EBRD said that it had a right to sell its stake in the company after Mehmet Hakan Atilla — a banker convicted in the US for helping Iran evade economic sanctions — was appointed Borsa Istanbul’s CEO.
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],”