■REAL ESTATE
Citi dismisses Asian staff
Citigroup Inc dismissed most of the employees at its real estate investment banking team in Asia after slumping property prices stifled share sales and acquisitions in the industry, three people familiar with the matter said. The bank dismissed at least five people two weeks ago, the people said, declining to be identified. Citigroup, which last month embarked on a plan to shed 52,000 jobs worldwide, will serve property clients through its country and corporate bankers after closing down the team, the people said. The bank, with operations in more than 100 countries, last month received US government insurance on US$306 billion in toxic assets.
■ELECTRONICS
LG forecasts slowdown
LG Electronics Inc, Asia’s second-largest mobile-phone maker, forecast its shipment growth will slow next year amid the global recession. “Growth will clearly slow down and we are aiming for a small increase from this year,” Skott Ahn, president of LG’s mobile-phone business, said in a statement yesterday, without giving details. The Seoul-based company said it expects to meet its shipment target of 100 million units for this year and hasn’t set a goal for next year because of the “uncertain” market outlook. LG, the world’s fifth-largest handset maker in the third quarter, said it plans to increase its market share to 10 percent next year. The phone maker had a 7.8 percent share in the July-to-September period, researcher Gartner Inc said.
■ENERGY
Temasek sells power utility
State-linked Singapore investment firm Temasek Holdings has sold its last remaining power utility to a Malaysian company — days after saying the tender process had stopped because of market conditions. Sabre Energy Industries, a wholly owned subsidiary of Malaysia’s YTL Power International Berhad, will pay S$3.6 billion (US$2.4 billion) and assume S$200 million in net debt, a Temasek statement said late on Tuesday. The sale of PowerSeraya is part of Temasek’s divestment plans announced in July last year, and the transaction with YTL Power International is expected to be completed early next year, Temasek said.
■TELECOMS
Telecom Italia to cut jobs
Italian telecommunications group Telecom Italia said yesterday it would cut a further 4,000 jobs in Italy from next year to 2011 as part of a restructuring plan. Telecom Italia, saddled with 35 billion euros (US$44 billion) in debt, launched a savings scheme last June that called for the elimination of 5,000 jobs in Italy. The June initiative aims at savings of 2 billion euros by 2011 and a sharp cut in the debt. The group has also announced its intention to sell off non-strategic operations in deals that could be worth up to 3.0 billion euros.
■JAPAN
Mergers increase 40%
Mergers and acquisitions involving Japanese firms surged 40 percent in the first 11 months of this year from a year ago, Recof Data Corp said. The total value of takeovers or investment deals reached ¥11 trillion (US$118 billion) this year through last month, compared with ¥7.83 trillion for the same period last year, according to data provided by a unit of Recof Corp, a mergers and acquisitions adviser. Among the top deals announced this year are Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group Inc’s US$9 billion investment in Morgan Stanley and the US$8.8 billion acquisition of Millennium Pharmaceuticals Inc by Takeda Pharmaceutical Co, Japan’s largest drugmaker.
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
NOVEL METHODS: The PLA has adopted new approaches and recently conducted three combat readiness drills at night which included aircraft and ships, an official said Taiwan is monitoring China’s People’s Liberation Army (PLA) exercises for changes in their size or pattern as the nation prepares for president-elect William Lai’s (賴清德) inauguration on May 20, National Security Bureau (NSB) Director-General Tsai Ming-yen (蔡明彥) said yesterday. Tsai made the comment at a meeting of the Legislative Yuan’s Foreign Affairs and National Defense Committee, in response to Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Wang Ting-yu’s (王定宇) questions. China continues to employ a carrot-and-stick approach, in which it applies pressure with “gray zone” tactics, while attempting to entice Taiwanese with perks, Tsai said. These actions aim to help Beijing look like it has
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
UNWAVERING: Paraguay remains steadfast in its support of Taiwan, but is facing growing pressure at home and abroad to switch recognition to Beijing, Pena said Paraguayan President Santiago Pena has pledged to continue enhancing cooperation with Taiwan, as he and Japanese Prime Minister Fumio Kishida expressed opposition to any unilateral change to the “status quo” in the Taiwan Strait using force, Japanese media reported on Saturday. Kishida yesterday completed a trip to France, Brazil and Paraguay, his first visit to South America since taking office in 2021. After the Japanese leader and Pena spoke for more than an hour on Friday, exchanging views on the situation in East Asia in the face of China’s increasing military pressure on Taiwan, they affirmed that “unilateral attempts to change the