Honda Motor Co, suffering from a 38 percent plunge in US auto sales last month, may ask to borrow money from Japan’s government to lend to US car buyers.
The amount of the loans and timing of the request to the state-owned Japan Bank for International Cooperation have not yet been determined, spokeswoman Akemi Ando said by phone yesterday.
Mazda Motor Corp is also considering a request for government loans, spokesman Toyota Tanaka said yesterday.
Honda and Mazda would follow Toyota Motor Corp, Japan’s biggest carmaker, in seeking loans from the government as the global recession hammers auto demand. Toyota’s financial unit may ask for ¥200 billion (US$2 billion) in loans, public broadcaster NHK reported on Tuesday, without citing anyone.
“Things look pretty grim at present,” said Edwin Merner, president of Atlantis Investment Research Corp in Tokyo, which manages US$3.1 billion. “By the end of the year, the year-on-year figures should start improving unless the world economy gets much worse.”
Honda may request at least ¥10 billion from the government, the Nikkei newspaper said yesterday, without citing sources.
Mazda, the Japanese carmaker partially owned by Ford Motor Co, increasingly needs the funds, mainly in the US and Europe, Tanaka said in a phone interview.
No details have been decided regarding a request for government funding, he said.
Japan will use some of its foreign-exchange reserves to lend to the state-owned bank that gives financing to Japanese companies operating abroad, Japanese Finance Minister Kaoru Yosano said on Tuesday.
The ministry may lend about US$5 billion to the bank this month, he said.
ROLLER-COASTER RIDE: More than five earthquakes ranging from magnitude 4.4 to 5.5 on the Richter scale shook eastern Taiwan in rapid succession yesterday afternoon Back-to-back weather fronts are forecast to hit Taiwan this week, resulting in rain across the nation in the coming days, the Central Weather Administration said yesterday, as it also warned residents in mountainous regions to be wary of landslides and rockfalls. As the first front approached, sporadic rainfall began in central and northern parts of Taiwan yesterday, the agency said, adding that rain is forecast to intensify in those regions today, while brief showers would also affect other parts of the nation. A second weather system is forecast to arrive on Thursday, bringing additional rain to the whole nation until Sunday, it
CONDITIONAL: The PRC imposes secret requirements that the funding it provides cannot be spent in states with diplomatic relations with Taiwan, Emma Reilly said China has been bribing UN officials to obtain “special benefits” and to block funding from countries that have diplomatic ties with Taiwan, a former UN employee told the British House of Commons on Tuesday. At a House of Commons Foreign Affairs Committee hearing into “international relations within the multilateral system,” former Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) employee Emma Reilly said in a written statement that “Beijing paid bribes to the two successive Presidents of the [UN] General Assembly” during the two-year negotiation of the Sustainable Development Goals. Another way China exercises influence within the UN Secretariat is
LANDSLIDES POSSIBLE: The agency advised the public to avoid visiting mountainous regions due to more expected aftershocks and rainfall from a series of weather fronts A series of earthquakes over the past few days were likely aftershocks of the April 3 earthquake in Hualien County, with further aftershocks to be expected for up to a year, the Central Weather Administration (CWA) said yesterday. Based on the nation’s experience after the quake on Sept. 21, 1999, more aftershocks are possible over the next six months to a year, the agency said. A total of 103 earthquakes of magnitude 4 on the local magnitude scale or higher hit Hualien County from 5:08pm on Monday to 10:27am yesterday, with 27 of them exceeding magnitude 5. They included two, of magnitude
Taiwan’s first drag queen to compete on the internationally acclaimed RuPaul’s Drag Race, Nymphia Wind (妮妃雅), was on Friday crowned the “Next Drag Superstar.” Dressed in a sparkling banana dress, Nymphia Wind swept onto the stage for the final, and stole the show. “Taiwan this is for you,” she said right after show host RuPaul announced her as the winner. “To those who feel like they don’t belong, just remember to live fearlessly and to live their truth,” she said on stage. One of the frontrunners for the past 15 episodes, the 28-year-old breezed through to the final after weeks of showcasing her unique