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World Business Quick Take

■ CHINA

Wal-Mart still in the game

Wal-Mart Stores Inc expects procurement in China to hold steady this year at about US$9 billion despite a rising exchange rate and product safety concerns, vice chairman Michael Duke said yesterday. Chinese suppliers have stayed competitive amid higher inflation and a rise in the yuan by improving efficiency and product quality, he said. "I wouldn't see any major variation" in procurement from last year's total of US$9 billion, he said. "China will continue to be a major production portion of direct purchases by Wal-Mart for a long time."



■ METALS

Power cuts trim jobs

Gold Fields Ltd, Africa's second-biggest gold producer, said it may eliminate 6,900 jobs, or 13 percent of its South African workforce, as limited power supplies reduce production. The company plans to close part of its Driefontein and Kloof mines and remodel its South Deep mine, it said in a statement to Johannesburg's Stock Exchange News Service yesterday. Gold Fields is the first major company to announce job cuts as a result of Eskom Holdings Ltd limiting power supplies to mines in South Africa to 90 percent of normal consumption.



■ ENERGY

Rains cut coal output

BHP Billiton Ltd, the world's biggest mining company, said rainfall in Queensland is expected to cut its share of coal production by as much as 4.6 million tonnes this business year. Total production at the BHP Billiton Mitsubishi Alliance venture will be reduced by between 6.5 million and 7.5 million tonnes in the year ending June 30, BHP Billiton said yesterday in a statement to the Australian Stock Exchange. Output at BHP Billiton Mitsui-owned mines will also be cut by between 500,000 and 1 million tonnes, it said. At least six coal suppliers in Queensland have warned customers they may miss contracted deliveries from some mines in the Australian state since monsoonal rains affected the Bowen Basin last month. The disruptions have helped drive spot prices for power-station coal and the type used in steelmaking to a record.



■ BANKING

Bank to sue informant

The Liechtenstein bank at the center of a tax evasion dispute with Germany said on Sunday it will sue the person it suspects of selling confidential information to German intelligence. LGT Group, which is wholly owned by the principality's ruling family, said it would file charges against a former employee convicted of stealing DVDs containing the names of 1,400 customers of its subsidiary LGT Treuhand. The bank identified the employee as a Liechtenstein citizen and said it believed until recently that the stolen information had been returned when the man was convicted in 2004 of serious fraud, harassment and sequestering documents and sentenced to a suspended one-year prison term.



■ THAILAND

Exports boost economy

The economy grew a faster-than-expected 5.7 percent in the fourth quarter from a year earlier on robust exports and a recovery in private investment and consumer spending, the government said yesterday. Exports rose strongly despite the baht's appreciation over the last two years and fears about a global economic slowdown. The economic planning agency raised its growth forecast for this year to 4.5 percent to 5.5 percent, up from an earlier projection of 4 percent to 5 percent.
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