SOUTH KOREA
Figures signal optimism
Early trade figures for this month showed that the country’s chip exports might be headed for the first monthly gain since late 2018, offering another sign that a recovery in global manufacturing is picking up momentum. Shipments of semiconductors during the first 20 days of the month rose 8.7 percent from a year earlier, the Korea Customs Service said yesterday. Overall exports dropped 0.2 percent in the period, the smallest decline in more than a year. The country’s 20-day trade report is closely watched as an early indicator of global demand, but January data are typically hard to interpret, because shifting dates for the New Year’s holiday cloud year-on-year comparisons. Still, the figures reinforced a view that global manufacturing is starting the year on firmer footing. Samsung Electronics Co, one of the world’s biggest semiconductor suppliers, this month beat earnings estimates after memorychip prices began to climb out of a persistent downturn.
BANKING
UBS yearly profit down 5%
Swiss banking giant UBS Group AG yesterday said that its full-year profit fell last year, but that economic stimulus measures and easier monetary conditions “contributed to a strong performance in financial markets in the fourth quarter and are likely to prevail.” UBS delivered solid full-year results in mixed market conditions, with net profit falling 5 percent to US$4.3 billion, the group said in a statement. Pretax profit, adjusted for restructuring costs, slipped 0.5 percent to US$6.04 billion, but earnings before tax in the global wealth management division rose 4 percent to US$3.4 billion. In the fourth quarter alone, adjusted pretax profit soared 153 percent to US$1.2 billion, driven mainly by wealth management and investment banking activities, UBS said. The bank said it would pay shareholders an increased dividend of US$0.73 per share for last year, compared with US$0.70 for 2018.
TECHNOLOGY
Uber to sell India unit
Uber Technologies Inc has agreed to sell Uber Eats in India to local rival Zomato, underscoring the US ride-hailing giant’s effort to cut back on loss-making operations globally. Uber is to offload the business in return for 9.99 percent of the Indian start-up, maintaining a foothold in one of the world’s fastest-growing Internet arenas, the companies said in a statement. As part of the deal, the US company would shutter operations, but direct all restaurants, delivery companies and diners to Zomato. Neither company offered up financial details, but the Economic Times reported that Zomato — which CB Insights last valued at US$2.2 billion — paid Uber about US$350 million.
AIRLINES
EasyJet positive on winter
British low-cost airline EasyJet PLC said its first-half winter performance would improve from last year, helped by robust travel demand and a slight easing of competition in the European short-haul flying market. EasyJet yesterday said that it expected first-half revenue per seat to increase by mid-to-high single digits, upgrading a previous forecast for it to rise by low-to-mid single digits. Reporting on the quieter winter period when fewer people travel, the airline, which tends to make all of its profit in the summer, said its first-half headline pretax loss would narrow from last year when it made a loss of £275 million (US$359 million).
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
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
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