■Interest rates
Bond firms look for rise
The Federal Reserve will raise interest rates in the second half next year as fiscal stimulus and 12 interest-rate reductions spur economic growth in the US, Wall Street's biggest bond-trading firms said. The central bank will lift its target rate for overnight loans between banks, or federal funds, from a 44-year low of 1.25 percent by the end of September 2003, according to a majority of economists at the 22 firms that trade with the Fed, known as primary dealers. The last time the central bank raised rates was in May 2000. Policy makers meet today, less than a week after the US unemployment rate rose to 6 percent in November, matching an eight-year high reached in April.
■ Transistors
IBM thinks really small
International Business Machines Corp scientists have built the world's smallest working silicon transistor, which may help reduce the size of computers and other electronic devices. The transistor is six nanometers in length, which are about 20,000 times smaller than a human hair. It's 10 times smaller than state-of-the-art transistors in production today, IBM said. A nanometer is one-billionth of a meter. Researchers are trying to shrink computing to microscopic levels to speed processors, cut power consumption and handle more complex problems. Details of the transistor will be published in a technical paper to be presented next week at the International Electron Devices Meeting in San Francisco. "The ability to build working transistors at these dimensions could allow us to put 100 times more transistors into a computer chip than is currently possible," said Randy Isaac, IBM Research vice president of science and technology, in a statement.
Agencies
NO-LIMITS PARTNERSHIP: ‘The bottom line’ is that if the US were to have a conflict with China or Russia it would likely open up a second front with the other, a US senator said Beijing and Moscow could cooperate in a conflict over Taiwan, the top US intelligence chief told the US Senate this week. “We see China and Russia, for the first time, exercising together in relation to Taiwan and recognizing that this is a place where China definitely wants Russia to be working with them, and we see no reason why they wouldn’t,” US Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines told a US Senate Committee on Armed Services hearing on Thursday. US Senator Mike Rounds asked Haines about such a potential scenario. He also asked US Defense Intelligence Agency Director Lieutenant General Jeffrey Kruse
INSPIRING: Taiwan has been a model in the Asia-Pacific region with its democratic transition, free and fair elections and open society, the vice president-elect said Taiwan can play a leadership role in the Asia-Pacific region, vice president-elect Hsiao Bi-khim (蕭美琴) told a forum in Taipei yesterday, highlighting the nation’s resilience in the face of geopolitical challenges. “Not only can Taiwan help, but Taiwan can lead ... not only can Taiwan play a leadership role, but Taiwan’s leadership is important to the world,” Hsiao told the annual forum hosted by the Center for Asia-Pacific Resilience and Innovation think tank. Hsiao thanked Taiwan’s international friends for their long-term support, citing the example of US President Joe Biden last month signing into law a bill to provide aid to Taiwan,
China’s intrusive and territorial claims in the Indo-Pacific region are “illegal, coercive, aggressive and deceptive,” new US Indo-Pacific Commander Admiral Samuel Paparo said on Friday, adding that he would continue working with allies and partners to keep the area free and open. Paparo made the remarks at a change-of-command ceremony at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam in Hawaii, where he took over the command from Admiral John Aquilino. “Our world faces a complex problem set in the troubling actions of the People’s Republic of China [PRC] and its rapid buildup of forces. We must be ready to answer the PRC’s increasingly intrusive and
STATE OF THE NATION: The legislature should invite the president to deliver an address every year, the TPP said, adding that Lai should also have to answer legislators’ questions The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) yesterday proposed inviting president-elect William Lai (賴清德) to make a historic first state of the nation address at the legislature following his inauguration on May 20. Lai is expected to face many domestic and international challenges, and should clarify his intended policies with the public’s representatives, KMT caucus secretary-general Hung Meng-kai (洪孟楷) said when making the proposal at a meeting of the legislature’s Procedure Committee. The committee voted to add the item to the agenda for Friday, along with another similar proposal put forward by the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP). The invitation is in line with Article 15-2