AVIATION
Airline license suspended
Kingfisher Airline’s licence was suspended on Saturday after it failed to address the Indian regulator’s concerns about its operations, forcing the debt-laden carrier to stop taking bookings. Controlled by Vijay Mallya — the self-styled “King of Good Times” — and seven months behind on salary payments among other missed bills, Kingfisher’s fleet has been grounded since the start of this month when a staff protest turned violent. The airline, which has never made a profit since being founded in 2004 and reeling under US$1.4 billion of debt, will have its licence reinstated if it provides a plan that satisfies the Directorate General of Civil Aviation.
CHINA
Land prices slowdown
Land prices rose at a slower annual pace for the fifth quarter, gaining 1.77 percent to an average 3,093 yuan (US$495) a square meter in the July to September period, the government said. Residential land prices gained 1.03 percent to 4,564 yuan a square meter in the same period, according to the monitoring of prices in 105 cities, the Ministry of Land and Resources said in a statement on its Web site dated Friday. The country’s new home prices last month rose in fewer than half the cities monitored by the government from a month earlier, according to data released by the statistics bureau on Thursday, indicating property curbs are stabilizing the housing market. Land supply and demand are forecast to increase in the fourth quarter amid government investments “to promote stable and healthy economic development,” while land prices are forecast to continue rising if no further real estate control measures are introduced, the land ministry said.
MEDIA
News Corp denies talks
Rupert Murdoch’s News Corp denied it has held talks to acquire the Los Angeles Times or Chicago Tribune once the newspapers’ owner, Tribune Co, emerges from bankruptcy. The denial encompasses reported talks with Tribune’s creditors, News Corp said. Published reports last week said that News Corp executives were in early negotiations with Tribune’s debt holders, including Los Angeles-based Oaktree Capital Management, who will gain control of the Chicago-based company after court supervision ends. News Corp is preparing to separate its entertainment and publishing businesses, in part to allow the 81-year-old Murdoch to pursue publishing unencumbered. Murdoch, whose roots in newspapers date back decades, has expressed interest in the Los Angeles Times in the past. He may go shopping for distressed newspapers once News Corp’s split becomes final next year, according to one person with knowledge of the matter.
IRELAND
IMF denies bad measures
The IMF denied on Saturday that austerity measures are to blame for the nation’s sluggish economy, saying that other factors are keeping growth flat. Greece, Portugal and Ireland are complaining that the IMF underestimated the economic and social impact of drastic spending cuts and tax hikes in the bailout programs, but a senior IMF official said that was not the problem in Ireland. The pace of the EU-IMF rescue program “has struck an appropriate balance and continues to do so for the period ahead, enabling Ireland to make steady progress in reducing fiscal imbalances while protecting the still fragile economic recovery,” Ajai Chopra, deputy director in the IMF’s European Department, said in a statement.
CHIP WAR: Tariffs on Taiwanese chips would prompt companies to move their factories, but not necessarily to the US, unleashing a ‘global cross-sector tariff war’ US President Donald Trump would “shoot himself in the foot” if he follows through on his recent pledge to impose higher tariffs on Taiwanese and other foreign semiconductors entering the US, analysts said. Trump’s plans to raise tariffs on chips manufactured in Taiwan to as high as 100 percent would backfire, macroeconomist Henry Wu (吳嘉隆) said. He would “shoot himself in the foot,” Wu said on Saturday, as such economic measures would lead Taiwanese chip suppliers to pass on additional costs to their US clients and consumers, and ultimately cause another wave of inflation. Trump has claimed that Taiwan took up to
SUPPORT: The government said it would help firms deal with supply disruptions, after Trump signed orders imposing tariffs of 25 percent on imports from Canada and Mexico The government pledged to help companies with operations in Mexico, such as iPhone assembler Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密), also known as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團), shift production lines and investment if needed to deal with higher US tariffs. The Ministry of Economic Affairs yesterday announced measures to help local firms cope with the US tariff increases on Canada, Mexico, China and other potential areas. The ministry said that it would establish an investment and trade service center in the US to help Taiwanese firms assess the investment environment in different US states, plan supply chain relocation strategies and
WASHINGTON POLICY: Tariffs of 10 percent or more and other new costs are tipped to hit shipments of small parcels, cutting export growth by 1.3 percentage points The decision by US President Donald Trump to ban Chinese companies from using a US tariff loophole would hit tens of billions of dollars of trade and reduce China’s economic growth this year, according to new estimates by economists at Nomura Holdings Inc. According to Nomura’s estimates, last year companies such as Shein (希音) and PDD Holdings Inc’s (拼多多控股) Temu shipped US$46 billion of small parcels to the US to take advantage of the rule that allows items with a declared value under US$800 to enter the US tariff-free. Tariffs of 10 percent or more and other new costs would slash such
Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) is reportedly making another pass at Nissan Motor Co, as the Japanese automaker's tie-up with Honda Motor Co falls apart. Nissan shares rose as much as 6 percent after Taiwan’s Central News Agency reported that Hon Hai chairman Young Liu (劉揚偉) instructed former Nissan executive Jun Seki to connect with French carmaker Renault SA, which holds about 36 percent of Nissan’s stock. Hon Hai, the Taiwanese iPhone-maker also known as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團), was exploring an investment or buyout of Nissan last year, but backed off in December after the Japanese carmaker penned a deal