BRAZIL
Auto tax increase postponed
The government postponed until next year increases in taxes on the sale of cars and trucks in a bid to stimulate demand for manufactured goods and spur economic growth, the Finance Ministry said on Saturday. Finance Minister Guido Mantega said the government wanted to “avoid the risk of a drop in sales throughout the year.” “The car industry is very important for Brazil’s economy, it accounts for 25 percent of industrial production,” Mantega said on Globo TV. “So, to keep industrial output growing, it is important that the auto industry keeps growing.”
ISRAEL
Offshore gas delivered
The government announced on Saturday it had begun delivering gas from a major northern offshore drill toward its shores, a move officials say will diminish the state’s dependency on foreign gas imports. Tamar, which has reserves of up to 238 billion cubic meters, lies 130km off the Mediterranean port city of Haifa. Tamar, which was discovered in 2009, is jointly owned by US company Nobel Energy and three Israeli firms — Delek, Isramco and Dor Alon.
MINING
Firm welcomes use of yuan
Fortescue Metals Group Ltd, Australia’s third-biggest iron ore producer, said it welcomes policies that promote the use of China’s yuan in global trade, following a report Australia was set to sign a conversion deal.
“Fortescue welcomes the ongoing internationalization of the yuan, which is becoming an increasingly important currency in global trade,” the Perth-based company said yesterday in response to a Bloomberg request for comment.
PHARMACEUTICALS
Court to rule on patent case
The Indian Supreme Court is to rule today on a landmark patent case involving Swiss drugmaker Novartis AG that focuses on demands by major companies that their investments be protected, against Indian companies that say they should be allowed to continue producing cheaper generic versions of many lifesaving medicines. A decision in the seven-year legal battle is keenly awaited by the two most interested parties — big pharma companies and health aid groups — with both sides saying the outcome will set a precedent with far-reaching consequences for the future availability of the drugs.
AUTOMAKERS
Ford dismisses accusations
US automaker Ford, which faces a lawsuit over claims its vehicles accelerate without warning, dismissed the accusations on Saturday as unscientific. Ford said it had addressed the issue with US regulators, whose work is “far more scientific and trustworthy than work done by personal injury lawyers and their paid experts,” an e-mail from a company spokesman said. On Friday, vehicle owners in 14 states filed a class-action lawsuit on behalf of “potentially millions of purchasers and lessees of Ford vehicles manufactured between 2002 and 2010.”
CRIME
Investment scam queried
People are questioning how a North Carolina man operated a US$600 million fraudulent investment scheme that attracted 1 million investors, even though regulators had received dozens of complaints about the company. Authorities say Paul Burks is the mastermind of one of the biggest investment scams in US history. His online company ZeekRewards was based in Lexington, North Carolina. Burks has agreed to pay a US$4 million penalty.
Taiwan’s foreign exchange reserves fell below the US$600 billion mark at the end of last month, with the central bank reporting a total of US$596.89 billion — a decline of US$8.6 billion from February — ending a three-month streak of increases. The central bank attributed the drop to a combination of factors such as outflows by foreign institutional investors, currency fluctuations and its own market interventions. “The large-scale outflows disrupted the balance of supply and demand in the foreign exchange market, prompting the central bank to intervene repeatedly by selling US dollars to stabilize the local currency,” Department of Foreign
Intel Corp is joining Elon Musk’s long-shot effort to develop semiconductors for Tesla Inc, Space Exploration Technologies Corp and xAI, marking a surprising twist in the chipmaker’s comeback bid. Intel would help the Terafab project “refactor” the technology in a chip factory, the company said on Tuesday in a post on X, Musk’s social media platform. That is a stage in the development process that typically helps make chips more powerful or reliable. The chipmaker’s shares jumped 4.2 percent to US$52.91 in New York trading on Tuesday. The Terafab project is a grand plan by Musk to eventually manufacture his own chips for
Taiwan Power Co (Taipower, 台電) yesterday said it plans to resume operations at two coal-fired power generators for three months to boost security of electricity supply as liquefied natural gas (LNG) supply risks are running high due to the Middle East conflict. The two coal-fired power generators are at Mailiao Power Plant in Yunlin County’s Mailiao Township (麥寮). The plant, operated by Formosa Plastics Group (台塑集團), supplied electricity to Taipower’s power grid until the end of last year. Taipower’s decision came about one month after Minister of Economic Affairs Kung Ming-hsin (龔明鑫) on March 10 said that the nation had no imminent
Some robotaxi passengers were left stranded in the middle of fast-moving traffic in a major Chinese city after their driverless vehicles stopped running, according to police and media reports on Wednesday. A preliminary investigation indicates more than 100 robotaxis came to a halt because of a “system malfunction,” police in the city of Wuhan said in a statement, without elaborating. No injuries were reported. One passenger told Chinese media that their robotaxi stopped after turning a corner. An instruction on a screen read: “Driving system malfunction. Staff are expected to arrive in 5 minutes.” After no one showed up, the passenger pushed
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