European stocks fell for the first week in three as forecasts from Bayerische Motoren Werke AG (BMW) and Ryanair Holdings PLC sent carmakers and travel companies lower and crude oil prices climbed.
BMW, the world’s largest maker of luxury cars, fell to the lowest since 2003. Ryanair posted its steepest weekly drop in four-and-a-half years. Michelin & Cie. retreated after the tiremaker cut its full-year target. BT Group PLC tumbled as the phone company reported its fourth straight quarterly profit decline.
Europe’s Dow Jones STOXX 600 Index lost 0.5 percent this week to 280.24. The measure has tumbled 23 percent so far this year after almost US$480 billion of credit losses and asset writedowns at banks prolonged the global economy’s slump, inflation eroded profits and crude oil surged to a record.
“The market is bound by a lot of uncertainty,” said Sebastian Paris-Horvitz, a strategist who helps oversee 550 billion euros (US$856 billion) at Axa Investment Managers in Paris.
“There’s an oil shock and there is the feeling that the economic climate in the US and in Europe will deteriorate. Earnings estimates also remain too high,” he said.
National benchmark indexes fell in 12 of the 18 western European markets this week. France’s CAC 40 decreased 1.4 percent. The UK’s FTSE 100 was little changed, while Germany’s DAX dropped 0.6 percent. Ireland’s ISEQ Index plunged 16 percent, led by Elan Corp, the nation’s largest drugmaker.
The paramount chief of a volcanic island in Vanuatu yesterday said that he was “very impressed” by a UN court’s declaration that countries must tackle climate change. Vanuatu spearheaded the legal case at the International Court of Justice in The Hague, Netherlands, which on Wednesday ruled that countries have a duty to protect against the threat of a warming planet. “I’m very impressed,” George Bumseng, the top chief of the Pacific archipelago’s island of Ambrym, told reporters in the capital, Port Vila. “We have been waiting for this decision for a long time because we have been victims of this climate change for
MASSIVE LOSS: If the next recall votes also fail, it would signal that the administration of President William Lai would continue to face strong resistance within the legislature The results of recall votes yesterday dealt a blow to the Democratic Progressive Party’s (DPP) efforts to overturn the opposition-controlled legislature, as all 24 Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) lawmakers survived the recall bids. Backed by President William Lai’s (賴清德) DPP, civic groups led the recall drive, seeking to remove 31 out of 39 KMT lawmakers from the 113-seat legislature, in which the KMT and the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) together hold a majority with 62 seats, while the DPP holds 51 seats. The scale of the recall elections was unprecedented, with another seven KMT lawmakers facing similar votes on Aug. 23. For a
Taiwan must invest in artificial intelligence (AI) and robotics to keep abreast of the next technological leap toward automation, Vice President Hsiao Bi-khim (蕭美琴) said at the luanch ceremony of Taiwan AI and Robots Alliance yesterday. The world is on the cusp of a new industrial revolution centered on AI and robotics, which would likely lead to a thorough transformation of human society, she told an event marking the establishment of a national AI and robotics alliance in Taipei. The arrival of the next industrial revolution could be a matter of years, she said. The pace of automation in the global economy can
All 24 lawmakers of the main opposition Chinese Nationalists Party (KMT) on Saturday survived historical nationwide recall elections, ensuring that the KMT along with Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) lawmakers will maintain opposition control of the legislature. Recall votes against all 24 KMT lawmakers as well as Hsinchu Mayor Ann Kao (高虹安) and KMT legislative caucus whip Fu Kun-chi (傅崐萁) failed to pass, according to Central Election Commission (CEC) figures. In only six of the 24 recall votes did the ballots cast in favor of the recall even meet the threshold of 25 percent of eligible voters needed for the recall to pass,
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