HEALTHCARE
Novartis to take over Alcon
Novartis AG will take full control of Alcon Inc after agreeing to pay US$12.9 billion for stock of the eye-care company it doesn’t already own, ending an 11-month dispute with minority shareholders. The payment will be a combination of Novartis shares and, if necessary, a cash value to result in a total of US$168 a share, the Basel, Switzerland-based company said yesterday in a statement. Alcon’s Independent Director Committee recommended approval of the merger agreement to the Alcon board, Novartis said. The Swiss drugmaker in January exercised an option to buy Nestle SA’s 52 percent stake in Alcon for an average of US$180 a share in cash, giving it 77 percent of the company. It also offered to purchase stock held by the public at a lower price.
ENERGY
Indian firm buys coal mine
An Indian infrastructure company has bought a thermal coal mine in Australia in one of India’s largest-ever investments in the country. The company, Lanco Infratech, said yesterday it had reached a binding purchase agreement with the administrator of the failed Griffin Coal company that operated the mine in Western Australia state. It didn’t disclose a price. The coal will fuel power stations in fast-growing India. The Australian newspaper without citing a source said Lanco paid up to A$850 million (US$850 million), beating out rival bidders from Japan and China.
ENERGY
TRU to buy Aussie assets
Hong Kong utility CLP Holdings Ltd said yesterday that its Australian subsidiary is buying energy assets from the New South Wales state government for A$2 billion (US$2 billion). CLP said its Australian unit, TRUenergy, agreed to buy state-owned EnergyAustralia’s energy retailing business, electricity trading rights for state-owned Delta Electricity’s coal fired power stations and development sites for three future power station projects. CLP said in a statement that the deal is expected to be completed by March. It will more than double TRUenergy’s customers in Australia to 2.76 million and double the company’s power generation capacity in the country to 5,446 megawatts from 3,046MW currently.
APPLIANCES
Electrolux to cut 2,100 jobs
Swedish appliance maker Electrolux AB says it plans to cut 2,100 jobs in Europe and Canada in the next three years as it continues to trim its costs. The Stockholm-headquartered group will close a cooking product plant in l’Assomption, Quebec, at the end of 2013. The plant has 1,300 staff and production from it will instead be transferred to a new facility, starting in 2012. The company also says it plans to lay off 800 employees in Europe next year and in 2012. The staff cuts will be made within its Major Appliances industrial operations, but will lead to no factory closures.
BANKING
RBS to transfer clients
The Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) will transfer its retail and commercial banking clients in three of China’s largest cities to Singapore’s DBS Bank, it was announced yesterday. Under an agreement between the two lenders, an estimated 25,000 RBS customers in Shanghai, Beijing and Shenzhen will be given the option to transfer their accounts to DBS, the Singapore bank said in a statement. It said the transfer process was expected to be completed within six months, and some employees would also move as part of the deal.
Taiwanese suppliers to Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co. (TSMC, 台積電) are expected to follow the contract chipmaker’s step to invest in the US, but their relocation may be seven to eight years away, Minister of Economic Affairs J.W. Kuo (郭智輝) said yesterday. When asked by opposition Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Legislator Niu Hsu-ting (牛煦庭) in the legislature about growing concerns that TSMC’s huge investments in the US will prompt its suppliers to follow suit, Kuo said based on the chipmaker’s current limited production volume, it is unlikely to lead its supply chain to go there for now. “Unless TSMC completes its planned six
Power supply and electronic components maker Delta Electronics Inc (台達電) yesterday said second-quarter revenue is expected to surpass the first quarter, which rose 30 percent year-on-year to NT$118.92 billion (US$3.71 billion). Revenue this quarter is likely to grow, as US clients have front-loaded orders ahead of US President Donald Trump’s planned tariffs on Taiwanese goods, Delta chairman Ping Cheng (鄭平) said at an earnings conference in Taipei, referring to the 90-day pause in tariff implementation Trump announced on April 9. While situations in the third and fourth quarters remain unclear, “We will not halt our long-term deployments and do not plan to
‘SHORT TERM’: The local currency would likely remain strong in the near term, driven by anticipated US trade pressure, capital inflows and expectations of a US Fed rate cut The US dollar is expected to fall below NT$30 in the near term, as traders anticipate increased pressure from Washington for Taiwan to allow the New Taiwan dollar to appreciate, Cathay United Bank (國泰世華銀行) chief economist Lin Chi-chao (林啟超) said. Following a sharp drop in the greenback against the NT dollar on Friday, Lin told the Central News Agency that the local currency is likely to remain strong in the short term, driven in part by market psychology surrounding anticipated US policy pressure. On Friday, the US dollar fell NT$0.953, or 3.07 percent, closing at NT$31.064 — its lowest level since Jan.
The New Taiwan dollar and Taiwanese stocks surged on signs that trade tensions between the world’s top two economies might start easing and as US tech earnings boosted the outlook of the nation’s semiconductor exports. The NT dollar strengthened as much as 3.8 percent versus the US dollar to 30.815, the biggest intraday gain since January 2011, closing at NT$31.064. The benchmark TAIEX jumped 2.73 percent to outperform the region’s equity gauges. Outlook for global trade improved after China said it is assessing possible trade talks with the US, providing a boost for the nation’s currency and shares. As the NT dollar
RSS