■ POLAND
Cabinet drafts finance plan
Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk said on Sunday his Cabinet had prepared a 24 billion euro (US$31 billion) plan to stabilize the nation’s finances and boost the economy. Tusk said the plan was preventative and that the country was in a “not bad situation despite the crisis.” The plan, which includes credit and deposit guarantees, credits for businesses and paves the way for faster absorption of EU funds, needs approval from parliament. The government already attempted to bolster confidence in the banking sector by guaranteeing deposits up to 50,000 euros. Finance Minister Jacek Rostowski said on Sunday the Cabinet also revised its projected GDP growth for next year to 3.7 percent from an earlier estimate of 4.8 percent.
■RUSSIA
Growth forecast slashed
The economic development ministry significantly downgraded next year’s growth forecast, but denied falling oil prices would spark an economic crisis, Ria Novosti news agency reported on Sunday. The economy would grow by between 3 percent and 3.5 percent next year, Deputy Economic Development Minister Andrei Klepach was quoted as saying, far less than the up to 5.7 percent growth predicted by the finance minister last month. Still, “the drop in oil prices to US$50 [a barrel] does not create a crisis,” Klepach was quoted as saying. He also revised downward growth for this year to between 6.8 percent and 7 percent, compared with an earlier estimate of 7.3 percent.
■AUTOMOBILES
Hyundai’s car sales dip
Hyundai Motor Co, South Korea’s largest automaker, said sales last month dropped 1.6 percent from a year earlier as the global economic slump cut vehicle demand. Hyundai sold 234,211 Elantra small cars, Sonata sedans and other models last month, the fewest in three months, compared with 237,941 last year, the Seoul-based carmaker said in an e-mailed statement yesterday. Domestic sales tumbled 34 percent while sales out of South Korea rose 8.2 percent. Hyundai is cutting output at domestic factories and in the US as fewer customers are buying new cars amid tighter credit and economic contraction.
■OIL
Exxon retains LNG forecast
Exxon Mobil Corp is keeping its forecast of 4 percent demand growth for liquefied natural gas (LNG) until 2030 even as the global economy contracts, said Peter Graham, manager of the company’s Papua New Guinea LNG project. Exxon expects to award an engineering contract for the facility in the second half of next year and seek long-term leases for its gas tanker supply in the first quarter, Graham said at a conference in Sydney yesterday. LNG is natural gas chilled to liquid form, reducing it to one six-hundredth of its original volume, for transportation by tanker to destinations not connected by pipeline.
■FINANCE
Zurich Financial buys firms
Zurich Financial Services AG, Switzerland’s biggest insurer, completed its purchase of two Brazilian insurers from Banco Mercantil do Brasil SA. Zurich Financial’s Brazilian unit took an 87 percent stake in Companhia de Seguros Minas Brasil and full control of Minas Brasil Seguradora Vida e Previdencia SA, the Zurich-based company said in an e-mailed statement yesterday. The Swiss insurer agreed to buy the two companies for 286 million reais (US$124.1 million) in July.
NO-LIMITS PARTNERSHIP: ‘The bottom line’ is that if the US were to have a conflict with China or Russia it would likely open up a second front with the other, a US senator said Beijing and Moscow could cooperate in a conflict over Taiwan, the top US intelligence chief told the US Senate this week. “We see China and Russia, for the first time, exercising together in relation to Taiwan and recognizing that this is a place where China definitely wants Russia to be working with them, and we see no reason why they wouldn’t,” US Director of National Intelligence Avril Haines told a US Senate Committee on Armed Services hearing on Thursday. US Senator Mike Rounds asked Haines about such a potential scenario. He also asked US Defense Intelligence Agency Director Lieutenant General Jeffrey Kruse
INSPIRING: Taiwan has been a model in the Asia-Pacific region with its democratic transition, free and fair elections and open society, the vice president-elect said Taiwan can play a leadership role in the Asia-Pacific region, vice president-elect Hsiao Bi-khim (蕭美琴) told a forum in Taipei yesterday, highlighting the nation’s resilience in the face of geopolitical challenges. “Not only can Taiwan help, but Taiwan can lead ... not only can Taiwan play a leadership role, but Taiwan’s leadership is important to the world,” Hsiao told the annual forum hosted by the Center for Asia-Pacific Resilience and Innovation think tank. Hsiao thanked Taiwan’s international friends for their long-term support, citing the example of US President Joe Biden last month signing into law a bill to provide aid to Taiwan,
China’s intrusive and territorial claims in the Indo-Pacific region are “illegal, coercive, aggressive and deceptive,” new US Indo-Pacific Commander Admiral Samuel Paparo said on Friday, adding that he would continue working with allies and partners to keep the area free and open. Paparo made the remarks at a change-of-command ceremony at Joint Base Pearl Harbor-Hickam in Hawaii, where he took over the command from Admiral John Aquilino. “Our world faces a complex problem set in the troubling actions of the People’s Republic of China [PRC] and its rapid buildup of forces. We must be ready to answer the PRC’s increasingly intrusive and
STATE OF THE NATION: The legislature should invite the president to deliver an address every year, the TPP said, adding that Lai should also have to answer legislators’ questions The Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) yesterday proposed inviting president-elect William Lai (賴清德) to make a historic first state of the nation address at the legislature following his inauguration on May 20. Lai is expected to face many domestic and international challenges, and should clarify his intended policies with the public’s representatives, KMT caucus secretary-general Hung Meng-kai (洪孟楷) said when making the proposal at a meeting of the legislature’s Procedure Committee. The committee voted to add the item to the agenda for Friday, along with another similar proposal put forward by the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP). The invitation is in line with Article 15-2