■ MARKETS
LSE launches trading system
The London Stock Exchange (LSE) announced yesterday the launch of a new pan-European equity trading platform in partnership with investment bank Lehman Brothers in the face of mounting competitive pressure. The exchange said the trading platform, named Baikal, would allow investors to trade shares in 14 European countries and enable them to keep their identities partially concealed. On Tuesday, NYSE Euronext said that it had agreed to buy 25 percent of the Doha Stock Exchange for US$250 million.
■ BEVERAGES
Anheuser-Busch to reject bid
US brewer Anheuser-Busch plans to reject a takeover offer from Belgian rival InBev, the Wall Street Journal reported on its Web site late on Wednesday. Citing an Anheuser-Busch insider, the paper reported that the US beer giant, based in St Louis, Missouri, plans to reject InBev’s offer of about US$46 billion. A hostile takeover attempt could follow. Anheuser-Busch’s major US brands include Budweiser and Michelob, along with a stable of international brands.
■ TOURISM
Coral islands to be leased
The Maldives, one of the world’s most exotic holiday destinations, plans to lease 19 uninhabited coral islands to be developed as upmarket resorts, officials said yesterday. The new resorts will add to the 44 islands that are either to be leased out this year or at various stages of development, Tourism Minister Mahamoud Shougee said by telephone from the capital Male. “Once the new investors are identified, they have four years to build the resort,” Shougee said.
■ MARKETS
Good times for palm oil firms
High global prices for palm oil mean good times ahead for Asian producers over the next 12 to 18 months, but little growth in much-touted biofuels, credit rating agency Moody’s said yesterday. “A rapid rise and continued high prices for crude palm oil [CPO] during the past 18 months have strengthened balance sheets in Asian palm-oil producers, who responded by buying more plantations and increased planting of greenfield properties,” Moody’s said in a report. But while the doubling of CPO prices between January last year and last March have left major producers with healthy balance sheets, the high cost of feedstock means biofuel projects have been delayed, it said.
■ SOFTWARE
Oracle posts higher profits
Enterprise software maker Oracle posted a 27 percent increase in fourth-quarter profit on Wednesday as income rose to US$2.04 billion, or US$0.39 a share, from US$1.6 billion, or US$0.31, in the year-earlier period. Based in Redwood City, California, Oracle said that it benefited from increases in international sales and rebounding US orders. It was aided by income from new acquisitions, including the US$8.5 billion purchase of BEA Systems.
■ RUBBER
Goodyear shuts Aussie plant
Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co has announced plans to close a high-cost Australian plant that employs 600 people. The shutdown of the South Pacific Tyres plant in Somerton, Victoria, by Dec. 31 will save Goodyear about US$35 million a year, the company said on Wednesday. “This completes our commitment to reduce high-cost capacity by about 25 million units and achieve annual cost savings of more than $150 million,” Goodyear chairman and chief executive Robert Keegan said in a news release.
The government is aiming to recruit 1,096 foreign English teachers and teaching assistants this year, the Ministry of Education said yesterday. The foreign teachers would work closely with elementary and junior-high instructors to create and teach courses, ministry official Tsai Yi-ching (蔡宜靜) said. Together, they would create an immersive language environment, helping to motivate students while enhancing the skills of local teachers, she said. The ministry has since 2021 been recruiting foreign teachers through the Taiwan Foreign English Teacher Program, which offers placement, salary, housing and other benefits to eligible foreign teachers. Two centers serving northern and southern Taiwan assist in recruiting and training
WIDE NET: Health officials said they are considering all possibilities, such as bongkrekic acid, while the city mayor said they have not ruled out the possibility of a malicious act of poisoning Two people who dined at a restaurant in Taipei’s Far Eastern Department Store Xinyi A13 last week have died, while four are in intensive care, the Taipei Department of Health said yesterday. All of the outlets of Malaysian vegetarian restaurant franchise Polam Kopitiam have been ordered to close pending an investigation after 11 people became ill due to suspected food poisoning, city officials told a news conference in Taipei. The first fatality, a 39-year-old man who ate at the restaurant on Friday last week, died of kidney failure two days later at the city’s Mackay Memorial Hospital. A 66-year-old man who dined
EYE ON STRAIT: The US spending bill ‘doubles security cooperation funding for Taiwan,’ while also seeking to counter the influence of China US President Joe Biden on Saturday signed into law a US$1.2 trillion spending package that includes US$300 million in foreign military financing to Taiwan, as well as funding for Taipei-Washington cooperative projects. The US Congress early on Saturday overwhelmingly passed the Further Consolidated Appropriations Act 2024 to avoid a partial shutdown and fund the government through September for a fiscal year that began six months ago. Under the package, the Defense Appropriations Act would provide a US$27 billion increase from the previous fiscal year to fund “critical national defense efforts, including countering the PRC [People’s Republic of China],” according to a summary
‘CARRIER KILLERS’: The Tuo Chiang-class corvettes’ stealth capability means they have a radar cross-section as small as the size of a fishing boat, an analyst said President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday presided over a ceremony at Yilan County’s Suao Harbor (蘇澳港), where the navy took delivery of two indigenous Tuo Chiang-class corvettes. The corvettes, An Chiang (安江) and Wan Chiang (萬江), along with the introduction of the coast guard’s third and fourth 4,000-tonne cutters earlier this month, are a testament to Taiwan’s shipbuilding capability and signify the nation’s resolve to defend democracy and freedom, Tsai said. The vessels are also the last two of six Tuo Chiang-class corvettes ordered from Lungteh Shipbuilding Co (龍德造船) by the navy, Tsai said. The first Tuo Chiang-class vessel delivered was Ta Chiang (塔江)