■ Automobiles
VW brings luxury car to US
In a risky new run at the luxury market, Volkswagen is bringing its most powerful production car to the US with a price tag of nearly US$100,000, prompting some doubts about its strategy. A 12-cylinder version of Volkswagens Phaeton sedan went on sale this week at 225 US dealerships with a base price of US$94,600, according to Gerd Klauss, chief executive of Volkswagen of America. The car comes stocked with luxury features, including a mechanism installed in the seats that provides a 10-minute back massage, VW executives say. The six liter, 420-horsepower engine accelerates to 100kph in 5.9 seconds, according to VW. It features all-wheel drive, electronic stabilization, automatic temperature and humidity controls, eight airbags, leather seats and wood trim -- a far cry from the bare-bones Volkswagens of the past. The car will go against high-priced import offerings such as the Mercedes-Benz S Class and BMW 7-Series.
■ Scandals
Bankruptcy will cost BoA
Bank of America said Thursday its exposure to potential losses in connection with the failure of Italian dairy giant Parmalat could reach US$274 million. "At year-end, our exposure to Parmalat involved both loan and derivative exposure and totaled US$274 million," the banking group said in a filing with the Securities and Exchange Commission. "Unfortunately, this bankruptcy [Parmalat's] will probably take a long time to be resolved, but we believe we are sufficiently positioned to deal with any material credit impact further down the road." The US banking giant is a focus of the scandal because the Italian company had falsely claimed to have a multibillion dollar deposit with the bank.
■ Computers
Sun loses US$125 million
Sun Microsystems Inc posted a smaller-than-expected loss in its fiscal second quarter as the computer and software maker realized benefits from controlling costs as well as the general improvement in high-tech spending by businesses. For the three months ended Dec. 28, Sun said Thursday it lost US$125 million, or US$0.04 per share, on sales of US$2.88 billion. The company lost US$2.3 billion, or US$0.72 per share, on sales of US$2.91 billion in the same period last year. Last year, Sun shifted its strategy beyond its own Sparc microprocessors and Solaris operating system. In addition to its own hardware and software, it now offers systems running the inexpensive Linux operating system on chips from Intel Corp.
■ Telecoms
WorldCom to cut 1,700 jobs
WorldCom Inc plans to fire another 1,700 employees, amounting to about 3 percent of its workforce, over the next two weeks, the Washington Post reported, citing people familiar with the matter. The dismissals will occur just weeks before the Ashburn, Virginia-based telecommunications company is expected to emerge from bankruptcy protection. WorldCom, the second-largest US long-distance phone company after AT&T Corp, in July 2002 filed the biggest bankruptcy case in US history, as measured by declared asset value. The company expects to come out of bankruptcy early this year as MCI Inc, the name of its best-known unit. The employee reductions are likely to be distributed throughout several divisions in the company's US operations, the Post said.
ROLLER-COASTER RIDE: More than five earthquakes ranging from magnitude 4.4 to 5.5 on the Richter scale shook eastern Taiwan in rapid succession yesterday afternoon Back-to-back weather fronts are forecast to hit Taiwan this week, resulting in rain across the nation in the coming days, the Central Weather Administration said yesterday, as it also warned residents in mountainous regions to be wary of landslides and rockfalls. As the first front approached, sporadic rainfall began in central and northern parts of Taiwan yesterday, the agency said, adding that rain is forecast to intensify in those regions today, while brief showers would also affect other parts of the nation. A second weather system is forecast to arrive on Thursday, bringing additional rain to the whole nation until Sunday, it
LANDSLIDES POSSIBLE: The agency advised the public to avoid visiting mountainous regions due to more expected aftershocks and rainfall from a series of weather fronts A series of earthquakes over the past few days were likely aftershocks of the April 3 earthquake in Hualien County, with further aftershocks to be expected for up to a year, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Based on the nation’s experience after the quake on Sept. 21, 1999, more aftershocks are possible over the next six months to a year, the agency said. A total of 103 earthquakes of magnitude 4 on the local magnitude scale or higher hit Hualien County from 5:08pm on Monday to 10:27am yesterday, with 27 of them exceeding magnitude 5. They included two, of magnitude
CONDITIONAL: The PRC imposes secret requirements that the funding it provides cannot be spent in states with diplomatic relations with Taiwan, Emma Reilly said China has been bribing UN officials to obtain “special benefits” and to block funding from countries that have diplomatic ties with Taiwan, a former UN employee told the British House of Commons on Tuesday. At a House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee hearing into “international relations within the multilateral system,” former Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) employee Emma Reilly said in a written statement that “Beijing paid bribes to the two successive Presidents of the [UN] General Assembly” during the two-year negotiation of the Sustainable Development Goals. Another way China exercises influence within the UN Secretariat is
Taiwan’s first drag queen to compete on the internationally acclaimed RuPaul’s Drag Race, Nymphia Wind (妮妃雅), was on Friday crowned the “Next Drag Superstar.” Dressed in a sparkling banana dress, Nymphia Wind swept onto the stage for the final, and stole the show. “Taiwan this is for you,” she said right after show host RuPaul announced her as the winner. “To those who feel like they don’t belong, just remember to live fearlessly and to live their truth,” she said on stage. One of the frontrunners for the past 15 episodes, the 28-year-old breezed through to the final after weeks of showcasing her unique