■ SINGAPORE
GIC buys ProLogis property
The government said it has acquired the property interests of a US-based firm in China and Japan for US$1.3 billion. Government investment firm GIC said in a statement late on Tuesday that it would pay cash to acquire the property operations of US-based ProLogis in the two Asian countries. The transaction was due to be completed next month, it said. GIC is one of two investment vehicles of the Singapore government and manages the country’s foreign reserves of more than US$100 billion through various investments.
■ELECTRONICS
RIM sues Motorola
Motorola Inc was sued by BlackBerry maker Research In Motion Ltd (RIM) over claims the mobile-phone maker is improperly blocking it from offering jobs to laid-off Motorola workers. RIM, in a complaint filed yesterday in state court in Chicago, asked for an order invalidating an agreement the companies reached this year not to solicit each other’s employees. The agreement expired in August and is no longer enforceable, the complaint said. Motorola, the world’s third-largest mobile-phone maker, is improperly trying to expand the agreement “to prevent the RIM entities from hiring any Motorola employees, including the thousands of employees Motorola has already fired or will fire,” RIM, based in Waterloo, Ontario, said in the complaint.
■AUTOMOBILES
Parts maker’s profits drop
Japan’s leading car parts maker Denso Corp said yesterday its full-year net profit would be one-tenth of an earlier forecast because of the poor performance of the auto industry and a strong yen. Denso, a major supplier to Toyota Motor Corp, now estimates its group net profit at ¥10 billion (US$110 million) for the year to March, down from ¥101 billion it projected less than two months ago. The financial crisis triggered in the US had affected the whole world, said Sadahiro Usui, managing officer of Denso. Denso also downgraded its sales projection to ¥3.3 trillion from ¥3.65 trillion estimated on Oct. 30. Its operating-profit forecast was lowered to ¥38 billion from ¥178 billion.
■FINANCE
Chinese bank to relaunch
Agricultural Bank of China will relaunch as a stock-holding company before the Lunar New Year on Jan. 26, bringing it a step closer to an eventual stock market listing, state media said yesterday. The lender has finished hiving off its bad loans, the China Business News reported, citing an unnamed source. The bank reported 818 billion yuan (US$119 billion) in non-performing loans at the end of last year. The bank, the weakest of China’s four major state-owned commercial banks, received a US$19 billion government cash injection last month as part of its preparations for an eventual stock listing.
■TRADE
China protests duties
China has protested at the WTO over US anti-dumping and countervailing duties imposed on some Chinese-made products, state media reported yesterday. The China Daily newspaper said the protest was the second by China since its 2001 entry into the WTO and was aimed at thwarting trade protectionism amid the global downturn. Import duties on four product categories including steel pipes and off-road tires were first levied by the US in September. Despite China’s protests, the US International Trade Commission claimed the duties were necessary to offset subsidies by the Chinese government to those exports, the report said.
Two US House of Representatives committees yesterday condemned China’s attempt to orchestrate a crash involving Vice President Hsiao Bi-khim’s (蕭美琴) car when she visited the Czech Republic last year as vice president-elect. Czech local media in March last year reported that a Chinese diplomat had run a red light while following Hsiao’s car from the airport, and Czech intelligence last week told local media that Chinese diplomats and agents had also planned to stage a demonstrative car collision. Hsiao on Saturday shared a Reuters news report on the incident through her account on social media platform X and wrote: “I
STILL ON THE TABLE: The government is not precluding advanced nuclear power generation if it is proven safer and the nuclear waste issue is solved, the premier said Taiwan is willing to be in step with the world by considering new methods of nuclear energy generation and to discuss alternative approaches to provide more stable power generation and help support industries, Premier Cho Jung-tai (卓榮泰) said yesterday. The government would continue to develop diverse and green energy solutions, which include considering advances in nuclear energy generation, he added. Cho’s remarks echoed President William Lai’s (賴清德) comments in an interview last month, saying the government is not precluding “advanced and newer nuclear power generation” if it is proven to be safer and the issue of nuclear waste is resolved. Lai’s comment had
‘BUILDING PARTNERSHIPS’: The US military’s aim is to continue to make any potential Chinese invasion more difficult than it already is, US General Ronald Clark said The likelihood of China invading Taiwan without contest is “very, very small” because the Taiwan Strait is under constant surveillance by multiple countries, a US general has said. General Ronald Clark, commanding officer of US Army Pacific (USARPAC), the US Army’s largest service component command, made the remarks during a dialogue hosted on Friday by Washington-based think tank the Center for Strategic and International Studies. Asked by the event host what the Chinese military has learned from its US counterpart over the years, Clark said that the first lesson is that the skill and will of US service members are “unmatched.” The second
STANDING TOGETHER: Amid China’s increasingly aggressive activities, nations must join forces in detecting and dealing with incursions, a Taiwanese official said Two senior Philippine officials and one former official yesterday attended the Taiwan International Ocean Forum in Taipei, the first high-level visit since the Philippines in April lifted a ban on such travel to Taiwan. The Ocean Affairs Council hosted the two-day event at the National Taiwan University Hospital International Convention Center. Philippine Navy spokesman Rear Admiral Roy Vincent Trinidad, Coast Guard spokesman Grand Commodore Jay Tarriela and former Philippine Presidential Communications Office assistant secretary Michel del Rosario participated in the forum. More than 100 officials, experts and entrepreneurs from 15 nations participated in the forum, which included discussions on countering China’s hybrid warfare
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