BANKING
HSBC pulls out of Russia
HSBC Holdings PLC, Europe’s largest bank, has decided to close its retail banking operations in Russia after just two years, following in the footsteps of British peer Barclays PLC, a document showed yesterday. “We encourage all customers to close their HSBC Premier and HSBC Plus accounts before June 30, 2011,” the document sent to HSBC clients said. HSBC, whose Russian unit is among the country’s top-100 lenders by assets, will concentrate its business on servicing corporate clients, it said. The move by HSBC, which started retail operations in Russia in mid-2009, followed an announcement by Barclays in February it was to sell its Russian retail unit as it was unable to compete and would focus on investment banking. Russia’s banking sector is dominated by state-owned banks, which control about 60 percent of the system’s overall assets.
ELECTRONICS
S-LCD will cancel shares
S-LCD Corp, a venture between Samsung Electronics Co and Sony Corp, will reduce capital by about 15 percent by canceling shares. The venture’s shares will be reduced to 660 million from 780 million, cutting capital to 3.3 trillion won (US$3 billion) from 3.9 trillion won, S-LCD said in a regulatory filing yesterday. The venture had excessive cash, James Chung, a Seoul-based spokesman for Samsung, said by telephone. Sony and Samsung agreed in 2004 to set up the US$1.8 billion LCD-making venture in South Korea to capitalize on the surge in demand for slimmer TVs that would replace bulky glass-tube sets.
JAPAN
Growth downgrade expected
The Bank of Japan is expected to downgrade its economic growth outlook for the year to March next year from 1.6 percent to about 0.8 percent in light of the deadly disasters last month, a report said yesterday. However, in its upcoming Outlook for Economic Activity and Prices, to be released on Thursday, the central bank will predict a rebound starting late this year on recovering output and reconstruction demand, the Nikkei Sangyo Shimbun said. Growth of 0.8 percent would be bullish compared with the average private-sector projection of slightly more than 0.4 percent, the business daily added. The news report came as bank Governor Masaaki Shirakawa joined private economists in expecting an economic contraction in the first half due to the magnitude 9.0 earthquake and tsunami on March 11.
ELECTRONICS
S Korea opens iOS 4 probe
South Korea’s telecoms regulator said yesterday it had launched an inquiry into Apple Inc to see whether the US giant’s collection of location data from its iPhone and iPad users violates privacy rules. The probe follows claims that Apple traced and stored geographical data from its mobile device users in countries such as France and Germany. The South Korean Communications Commission said it had sent a list of questions asking Apple Korea to clarify why location data was collected from mobile device users and how frequently such data was recorded. Apple is also required to explain why such information is not encrypted, whether device users have a choice over data deletion or data storage and whether such data is stored on its servers, it said. British security researchers have said the position--logging feature is contained in iOS 4, the operating system for the iPhone and iPad released in June.
UNPRECEDENTED PACE: Micron Technology has announced plans to expand manufacturing capabilities with the acquisition of a new chip plant in Miaoli Micron Technology Inc unveiled a newly acquired chip plant in Miaoli County yesterday, as the company expands capacity to meet growing demand for advanced DRAM chips, including high-bandwidth memory chips amid the artificial intelligence boom. The plant in Miaoli County’s Tongluo Township (銅鑼), which Micron acquired from Powerchip Semiconductor Manufacturing Corp (力積電) for US$1.8 billion, is expected to make a sizeable capacity contribution to the company from fiscal 2028, the company said in a statement. It would be an extended production site of Micron’s large-scale manufacturing hub in Taichung, the company said. As the global semiconductor industry is racing to reach US$1 trillion
Singapore-based ride-hailing and delivery giant Grab Holdings Ltd has applied for regulatory approval to acquire the Taiwan operations of Germany-based Delivery Hero SE's Foodpanda in a deal valued at about US$600 million. Grab submitted the filing to the Fair Trade Commission on Friday last week, with the transaction subject to regulatory review and approval, the company said in a statement yesterday. Its independent governance structure would help foster a healthy and competitive market in Taiwan if the deal is approved, Grab said. Grab, which is listed on the NASDAQ, said in the filing that US-based Uber Technologies Inc holds about 13 percent of
Taiwan’s food delivery market could undergo a major shift if Singapore-based Grab Holdings Ltd completes its planned acquisition of Delivery Hero SE’s Foodpanda business in Taiwan, industry experts said. Grab on Monday last week announced it would acquire Foodpanda’s Taiwan operations for US$600 million. The deal is expected to be finalized in the second half of this year, with Grab aiming to complete user migration to its platform by the first half of next year. A duopoly between Uber Eats and Foodpanda dominates Taiwan’s delivery market, a structure that has remained intact since the Fair Trade Commission (FTC) blocked Uber Technologies Inc’s
Memory chip stocks extended their losses yesterday after Alphabet Inc’s Google publicized research that could allow more efficient use of the storage needed for artificial intelligence (AI) development. SK Hynix Inc and Samsung Electronics Co, South Korean leaders in the market, fell more than 6 percent and about 5 percent respectively in Seoul. In the US, Micron Technology Inc, Western Digital Corp and Sandisk Corp slid more than 2 percent in pre-market trading, after they all closed lower on Wednesday. Memory companies have been on a tear in recent months as the rapid development of AI infrastructure triggered a spike in chip
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