■INVESTMENT
China’s FDI rises 18.1%
Foreign direct investment (FDI) in China rose 18.1 percent in the first eight months of this year, the government said yesterday, as confidence in the economy appeared to moderate slightly. Foreign companies pumped US$65.95 billion into China in the January-August period, Commerce Ministry spokesman Yao Jian (姚堅) said. That marked a slight deceleration from the 20.7 percent growth logged from January to July and the 19.6 percent increase seen in the first half. For last month, FDI totaled US$7.6 billion up 1.4 percent over the same month last year, Yao said. That compares to a jump of 29.2 percent in July.
■FOREX
Zoellick backs yuan’s rise
World Bank president Robert Zoellick threw his support behind calls for a strengthening of China’s yuan currency yesterday, as US lawmakers readied for hearings on the sensitive issue. “I share the view that has been expressed by the IMF that it would be appropriate to have an appreciation of the currency,” Zoellick told reporters in Beijing. A key congressional committee was scheduled to begin hearings yesterday in Washington on ways of pressuring Beijing to let the yuan rise.
■ECONOMY
Big payoff for software IPR
Asia could generate billions of dollars in new business and taxes and create hundreds of thousands of jobs within a few years if it cracks down on software piracy, an industry study showed yesterday. The Business Software Alliance (BSA) and research group IDC said nearly 60 percent of all software programs installed on personal computers in the region are pirated. Reducing piracy by 10 percentage points in four years would produce almost US$41 billion in economic activity, create 350,000 new jobs and generate nearly US$9 billion in taxes, the study said.
■INVESTMENT
More phones than S Koreans
Gadget-mad South Korea now has more mobile phones than people, with a growing number of users carrying multiple handsets for business purposes, the Korea Communications Commission said yesterday. It said there were 50 million mobile service subscribers as of this month, more than the population of 48.8 million. The agency also said there are 3.67 million smartphone users in the country, 7.4 percent of the total.
■INVESTMENT
Buffett cuts Moody’s stake
Billionaire Warren Buffett’s company has unloaded another 1.35 million shares of credit ratings firm Moody’s Corp, but Berkshire Hathaway Inc still controls 12.6 percent of Moody’s stock. Berkshire reported the latest stock sales to the Securities and Exchange Commission on Tuesday. Berkshire still holds more than 29.4 million Moody’s shares after the most-recent sales. However, early last year Buffett’s Omaha-based company held 48 million shares of Moody’s stock before it started reducing its holdings.
■MEDIA
News Ltd sells ‘Fiji Times’
Australia’s News Ltd yesterday said it had sold the Fiji Times newspaper after a foreign ownership crackdown by the military regime that has alarmed neighboring countries and rights groups. The Australian arm of Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp said it had reluctantly sold Fiji’s oldest newspaper to Suva-based conglomerate Motibhai for an undisclosed sum. The newspaper, established in 1868, faced closure at the end of the month if News Ltd could not find a local buyer.
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