Print

Mail

wiki links

World Business Quick Take

■ ENERGY

Firms investing in Turrum

An ExxonMobil Corp subsidiary and BHP Billiton announced plans yesterday to spend US$1.25 billion to tap oil and gas reserves in the Bass Strait off southern Australia. The joint venture will build an offshore platform off Victoria state at a site called the Turrum field and aims to extract about 28.3 billion cubic meters of natural gas and 110 million barrels of oil and gas liquids, the companies said. The Turrum project is expected to start producing from 2011, with gas sales from 2015. ExxonMobil Australia chairman Mark Nolan said the Turrum project had enough resources to supply the energy needs of a city of 1 million people for more than 20 years.

■ INTERNET

High court finds Horie guilty

The Tokyo High Court yesterday upheld a lower court ruling that found Japanese Internet tycoon Takafumi Horie guilty of breaking a securities law and sentenced him to two years and six months in prison without suspension, media reports said. The 35-year-old former president of Livedoor Co had pleaded not guilty to charges of forging the company’s financial records and falsifying information about the acquisition of a Japanese publisher to raise his company’s stock price. Horie’s lawyer appealed the high court’s ruling at the Supreme Court yesterday. The Tokyo District Court in March last year found Horie guilty of initiating the accounting fraud, which also involved other Livedoor executives.



■ AUTOMOBILES

Honda posts record profits

Japan’s Honda Motor Co reported record fiscal first-quarter profits as sales growth in new markets offset damage from a stronger yen and soaring material costs. Honda said it earned ¥179.6 billion (US$1.7 billion) in the second quarter, up 8.1 percent from the same period the previous year. Sales for the quarter dipped 2.2 percent to ¥2.87 trillion, largely because a rising yen eroded the value of the automaker’s overseas earnings. The Tokyo-based manufacturer of the Civic and Accord compacts said it still sold more vehicles worldwide than in any other fiscal first quarter. Demand for Honda products is booming in Asia, Brazil and other new markets, it said.



■ SOUTH KOREA

Economic growth slows

Economic growth slowed sharply in the second quarter, official figures showed yesterday, amid warnings of a slump that could further test President Lee Myung-bak’s sagging popularity. Growth slowed below forecast to an annual rate of 4.8 percent in the last quarter from 5.8 percent in the first quarter, the Bank of Korea said, as soaring oil prices pushed up inflation and weakened domestic demand. “Because of high prices and the jobless rate, domestic consumption weakened in the second quarter, weighing down on the growth momentum,” Choi Chun-sin, a director of the bank, told reporters. The latest growth figure is the lowest since early last year.



■ AUTOMOBILES

Ford plans restructuring

Ford Motor Co announced plans to accelerate its vast restructuring plan on Thursday after the sputtering auto giant posted its worst quarterly loss in history. The US$8.7 billion loss in the second quarter was largely caused by hefty charges as Ford wrote down the value of its assets and recognized losses from auto leasing. The automaker has now lost nearly US$24 billion since 2006 and recently backed off plans to return to profitability by next year amid a weak US economy.


This story has been viewed 920 times.