■ Internet
Yahoo to offer Internet calls
Yahoo Inc will upgrade its instant messenger service to let computer users make phone calls as competition heats up in the growing market for Internet calling. Calls in the US will cost US$0.01 a minute. Calls to 30 other countries will be priced at less than USS$0.02, Sunnyvale, California-based Yahoo said in a statement. Customers will be able to buy a phone number for US$2.99 a month that lets them receive calls on personal computers. Yahoo, the most-visited Internet site, is introducing the features within the next week.
■ Electronics
Sanyo to sell financial arm
Struggling Japanese electronics maker Sanyo Electric is in final stages of talks with Goldman Sachs to sell a bulk of its 52 percent stake in debt-ridden Sanyo Electric Credit, its key financial arm, the Nihon Keizai Shimbun said yesterday without naming sources. As for the money-losing home appliances division, Sanyo is considering setting up a new joint venture with China's biggest home appliance maker Haier Group (海爾) to transfer production, the economic daily said. Sanyo would not confirm the report.
■ Development
Intel invests in Malaysia
Intel Corp will invest US$230 million in Malaysia to set up a test and assembly facility and a design and development center. The latest investment will add 2,000 jobs at Intel's operations in Malaysia, chairman Craig Barrett said in a press release. Barrett, 66, is in Malaysia on a trip to Asia this week that includes India, and Beijing and Chengdu in China. The company earlier this week pledged investments of more than US$1 billion in these two countries. Intel currently has 10,000 employees in Malaysia, the company's biggest operational site outside the US.
■ Mining
Gold soars to 24-year high
Gold galloped to a new 24-and-a-half-year high yesterday on continued fund buying as the yellow metal, backed by strong fundamentals, outperformed traditional assets such as stocks and bonds. But analysts said that gold remained very vulnerable to fund liquidation after it made steep gains in recent weeks on the back of inflation concerns, high oil prices and fund interest in gold and other commodities. Spot gold had risen to between US$518.00 and US$518.60 an ounce, against between US$513.90 and US$514.70 last quoted in New York on Wednesday. Earlier, gold hit US$518.50 an ounce, its highest since April 1981.
■ Oil
CNOOC eyes Yukos' assets
China National Offshore Oil Corp (CNOOC) has expressed interest in acquiring US$10 billion of assets in dismembered Russian oil group Yukos, state press reported yesterday. "Cooperation with Yukos not only depends on the companies' intentions but it also needs a high degree of government policy and coordination," CNOOC chairman Fu Chengyu (傅成玉) was quoted as saying in the official Shanghai Securities News. Fu visited Russia in August following CNOOC's unsuccessful bid for California oil group Unocal, the newspaper said, but it was unclear if he had met with any Yukos officials. Neither did the report say whether negotiations between the two companies had begun, but alleged Fu was interested in non-core assets.
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
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
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
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