Banking
World Bank position filled
The World Bank on Friday named Cai Jinyong (蔡金勇), a Chinese national who worked for Goldman Sachs, to head its private-sector investment arm, placing a candidate from an emerging market country in a key post at the global development lender. The World Bank said it had picked Cai to be executive vice president and chief executive of the International Finance Corp, which invested US$20 billion in private-sector projects in developing countries last year. He previously served as a managing director at Goldman Sachs Group, and was involved in Goldman’s management globally, IFC said in statement. Emerging market countries have long pushed to have more say in the selection process of the heads of the World Bank and the IMF. Cai’s appointment is the first post to be filled by new World Bank President Jim Yong Kim, since he assumed his position on July 1.
AUTOMAKERS
Renault announces job cuts
French automaker Renault said on Friday that a voluntary job cut plan at its struggling South Korean unit Samsung Motors could affect up to 80 percent of its staff, or almost 4,700 workers. Workers would be let go “on a voluntary basis, with severance pay of up to two years pay depending on seniority,” the spokeswoman said. Employees who agree to leave are also to get two years of education fees for children and other allowances. Renault had said earlier in the day in South Korea that it would offer some staff at the company voluntary retirement, but did not say how many might be affected. Renault Samsung Motors has seen its sales wilt under pressure from South Korea’s dominant Hyundai-Kia group.
Airlines
Kingfisher reveals losses
Cash-strapped Kingfisher Airlines yesterday said quarterly losses more than doubled from a year earlier, fuelling fresh doubts about the future of the private Indian carrier. Net loss widened to 6.60 billion rupees (US$120 million) in the financial quarter to June from a loss of 2.63 billion rupees in the same period last year, as revenues slumped due to reduced operations. Kingfisher — which has never posted a profit since its launch in 2005 -— said it still hoped to “get recapitalized” and added it was “in discussion with several strategic and financial investors to bring in fresh capital”. The company, which is carrying a US$1.4 billion debt-load, did not identify the potential investors.
BANKING
European crisis fund
Finnish Prime Minister Jyrki Katainen on Friday proposed creating a bank-financed European crisis fund to recapitalize ailing banks, as part of a three-pronged supervision mechanism.
In an interview conducted on Aug. 1 and published on Friday, Katainen proposed a single European banking supervisory authority, a joint banking crisis fund and a common deposit protection fund. “We should be able to build a system where banks cannot shake up entire countries. One solution, in addition to monitoring, could be a European bank crisis fund,” Katainen said. The fund’s resources would be collected from the banks, he said. Katainen said the central problem of the euro crisis was the connection between banks and states, and stressed the link needed to be broken.
EXTRATERRITORIAL REACH: China extended its legal jurisdiction to ban some dual-use goods of Chinese origin from being sold to the US, even by third countries Beijing has set out to extend its domestic laws across international borders with a ban on selling some goods to the US that applies to companies both inside and outside China. The new export control rules are China’s first attempt to replicate the extraterritorial reach of US and European sanctions by covering Chinese products or goods with Chinese parts in them. In an announcement this week, China declared it is banning the sale of dual-use items to the US military and also the export to the US of materials such as gallium and germanium. Companies and people overseas would be subject to
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) founder Morris Chang (張忠謀) yesterday said that Intel Corp would find itself in the same predicament as it did four years ago if its board does not come up with a core business strategy. Chang made the remarks in response to reporters’ questions about the ailing US chipmaker, once an archrival of TSMC, during a news conference in Taipei for the launch of the second volume of his autobiography. Intel unexpectedly announced the immediate retirement of former chief executive officer Pat Gelsinger last week, ending his nearly four-year tenure and ending his attempts to revive the
WORLD DOMINATION: TSMC’s lead over second-placed Samsung has grown as the latter faces increased Chinese competition and the end of clients’ product life cycles Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) retained the No. 1 title in the global pure-play wafer foundry business in the third quarter of this year, seeing its market share growing to 64.9 percent to leave South Korea’s Samsung Electronics Co, the No. 2 supplier, further behind, Taipei-based TrendForce Corp (集邦科技) said in a report. TSMC posted US$23.53 billion in sales in the July-September period, up 13.0 percent from a quarter earlier, which boosted its market share to 64.9 percent, up from 62.3 percent in the second quarter, the report issued on Monday last week showed. TSMC benefited from the debut of flagship
TENSE TIMES: Formosa Plastics sees uncertainty surrounding the incoming Trump administration in the US, geopolitical tensions and China’s faltering economy Formosa Plastics Group (台塑集團), Taiwan’s largest industrial conglomerate, yesterday posted overall revenue of NT$118.61 billion (US$3.66 billion) for last month, marking a 7.2 percent rise from October, but a 2.5 percent fall from one year earlier. The group has mixed views about its business outlook for the current quarter and beyond, as uncertainty builds over the US power transition and geopolitical tensions. Formosa Plastics Corp (台灣塑膠), a vertically integrated supplier of plastic resins and petrochemicals, reported a monthly uptick of 15.3 percent in its revenue to NT$18.15 billion, as Typhoon Kong-rey postponed partial shipments slated for October and last month, it said. The
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