Mon, Oct 28, 2013 page15

• World Business Quick Take

  • Agencies
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  AIRCRAFT

  Berlin urged stump up aviation

  Airbus on Saturday urged the German government to pay out a promised final loan instalment of 600 million euros (US$830 million) for the construction of the A350, after the aircraft manufacturer said it had created German jobs in return. Airbus chief operating officer Guenter Butschek told the German daily Tagesspiegel that the firm was offering 4,000 jobs — 250 percent more than originally planned — in a bid to unfreeze the last loan tranche, which has been blocked for months by Berlin pending agreement on German-based manufacturing and research jobs. Butschek said that Airbus, a subsidiary of France-based EADS, was capable of completing the A350 development program even without the outstanding loan amount.

  BANKING

  CCB posts Q3 profit

  China Construction Bank Corp (CCB, 中國建設銀行), the nation’s second-largest lender, posted a 9.4 percent gain in third-quarter profit as it boosted lending and fee income. Net income climbed to 56.8 billion yuan (US$9.3 billion), or 0.23 yuan a share, from 51.9 billion yuan, or 0.21 yuan, a year earlier, the Beijing-based lender said in a Shanghai stock exchange filing yesterday. That compared with the 57.2 billion yuan average estimate of 10 analysts compiled by Bloomberg. Construction Bank pledged in August to direct more lending to small and micro-sized businesses, which offer fatter lending margins, as it battles a slowdown in the world’s second-largest economy. While expansion accelerated for the first time in three quarters July to last month, China may still post its slowest full-year growth since 1999, according to a Bloomberg survey of economists.

  ECONOMY

  Portuguese angry about cuts

  Thousands of demonstrators protested in Portugal on Saturday against salary cuts and public sector reforms imposed by the government under the country’s international bailout deal. Crowds rallied in the old center of the capital Lisbon and marched toward parliament, while rallies were also staged in the northern city of Porto and 12 other towns, in demonstrations called by a citizens’ collective known as “Get lost, troika.” The word troika refers to the three international bodies that agreed Portugal’s 78 billion euro (US$108 billion) rescue deal in 2011 — the EU, the European Central Bank and the IMF. In return for the bailout money to prevent the country from financial collapse, the troika demanded economic reforms to get Portugal’s public deficit down to 4 percent of output by next year.

  MINING

  Mongolia and Rio make up

  Mongolia and Rio Tinto Group have resolved some of the disputes that have stalled the expansion of their US$6.6 billion Oyu Tolgoi copper mine, a Mongolian board member of the venture said. “Within the last 10 days we could resolve certain issues; we have reduced the state of urgency,” Davaadorj Ganbold, one of three Mongolians on the Oyu Tolgoi LLC board, said in an interview in Ulan Bator on Saturday, adding that some points remain to be agreed on. “Issues related to cost overruns, the feasibility study and project financing are large and broad issues that cannot be resolved in four or five days,” said Ganbold, a board member since last month and also executive director at Erdenes Oyu Tolgoi LLC, the company that holds the government’s 34 percent stake in the project. While open-pit work continues, the dispute has led to the suspension of underground construction and the layoff of about 1,700 workers.
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