■COMPUTING
IBM Japan denies reports
IBM Japan yesterday denied it had evaded taxes after news reports said authorities were probing whether it had failed to declare more than US$4.4 billion in income. The Asahi Shimbun reported that the firm’s holding company IBM AP Holdings failed to declare ¥400 billion (US$4.4 billion) and may be asked to pay back taxes worth more than ¥30 billion. The Tokyo Regional Taxation Bureau “appears to have judged that the group generated losses by manipulating intra-group trade of IBM Japan shares so as to evade taxation,” the report said. IBM Japan declined to comment on the report’s details but said in a statement: “IBM has fully paid all taxes required under Japanese law. All Japanese transactions adhered to Japanese tax law.”
■INTERNET
YouTube hits milestone
YouTube said on Wednesday that 24 hours worth of video are being uploaded to the video-sharing site every minute. “What’s next? 30 hours? 36 hours?” YouTube director of product management Hunter Walk asked in a blog post. “A day’s worth of content uploaded to YouTube every minute is a big achievement for our community and speaks to the role video plays in connecting and changing the world one upload at a time,” Walker said. Google-owned YouTube announced last May that 20 hours of video were being uploaded to the site every minute, up from 15 hours in January. In mid-2007, six hours of video were being uploaded to YouTube every minute, the site says.
■FOOD
Kraft Foods to cut sodium
Kraft Foods, the maker of Oreo cookies and Velveeta cheese, said it plans to cut sodium levels in its North American products by about 10 percent over the next two years, making it the latest food maker trying to address health concerns. The largest North American food maker said on Wednesday that its plans would eliminate more than 4,500 tonnes of salt from some of North America’s most popular foods. The news came a day after the world’s No. 2 soft-drink maker, PepsiCo, said it would to stop sales of full-sugar soft drinks to primary and secondary schools on a global scale by 2012.
■SPORTING GOODS
Nike posts stronger sales
Nike Inc said stronger sales helped boost its third-quarter profit and its shares soared in after-hours trading on Wednesday. Nike, the world’s largest athletic shoe and clothing company, reported that it earned US$496 million, or US$1.01 per share, for the quarter. That’s more than double the US$244 million, or US$0.50 per share, it reported for the same period a year earlier, which included a US$241 million charge related to the company’s Umbro subsidiary. Excluding those charges, Nike’s profit grew a more modest 2 percent. Nike said its revenue grew 7 percent to US$4.7 billion, helped in part by foreign exchange rates.
■CHINA
PayPal ties with UnionPay
PayPal, the online payment platform of US e-commerce giant eBay, will tie up with a Chinese partner to allow consumers in China to buy from overseas merchants, according to a report. Customers of China UnionPay, China’s largest provider of electronic payment services, will be able to link their bankcard accounts with PayPal from the third quarter of this year under the deal, Wednesday’s Wall Street Journal 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
CHINA REACTS: The patrol and reconnaissance plane ‘transited the Taiwan Strait in international airspace,’ the 7th Fleet said, while Taipei said it saw nothing unusual The US 7th Fleet yesterday said that a US Navy P-8A Poseidon flew through the Taiwan Strait, a day after US and Chinese defense heads held their first talks since November 2022 in an effort to reduce regional tensions. The patrol and reconnaissance plane “transited the Taiwan Strait in international airspace,” the 7th Fleet said in a news release. “By operating within the Taiwan Strait in accordance with international law, the United States upholds the navigational rights and freedoms of all nations.” In a separate statement, the Ministry of National Defense said that it monitored nearby waters and airspace as the aircraft
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