RUSSIA
Outlook worse than forecast
The nation’s economy will perform far worse than forecast over the next two decades, lagging global growth, business daily Vedomosti reported on Thursday, citing Russian Economy Ministry documents. It said the ministry’s strategy on economic development until 2030 warns that Russia will remain heavily dependent on oil and gas, face capital outflows, budget deficits and a growing wealth gap between its regions. According to the document, GDP will grow on average by 2.8 percent annually until 2030.
AUSTRALIA
Jobless rate unchanged
Unemployment remained unchanged at 5.7 percent last month, despite the loss of nearly 28,000 full-time jobs as the mining investment boom unwinds. Economists had been expecting a figure of 5.8 percent, which would have matched the four-year high reached in August. The September number was revised upwards from 5.6 percent. While the rate was steady, a total of 27,900 full-time jobs were lost, largely offset by part-time employment increasing by 28,900.
MEXICO
Growth forecast cut
The central bank cut its growth forecast for this year and next year on Wednesday, citing weaker economic activity in the first half of the year in Latin America’s second-biggest economy. In an inflation report, the bank said it now expected the economy to expand between 0.9 percent and 1.4 percent this year, down from a previous outlook ranging between 2 percent and 3 percent. The forecast for next year was reduced to 3 percent to 4 percent from 3.2 percent to 4.2 percent. The bank said inflation would remain at about 3.5 percent through to next year.
BANKING
Wells Fargo settles claims
Wells Fargo & Co said on Wednesday it had agreed to pay US$335 million to settle claims by Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac that it overstated the quality of mortgage securities it sold them. The US bank said the two state-controlled housing finance agencies had agreed to the sums having earlier pulled out of a class-action suit against it for overstating the quality of mortgage-backed securities it marketed in the run-up to the 2008-2009 financial crash.
STEEL
ArcelorMittal losses shrink
ArcelorMittal SA, the world’s largest steelmaker, says its third quarter loss shrank as the company cut costs and the steel market is poised for recovery. The Luxembourg-based company yesterday posted a net loss of US$193 million, compared with a loss of US$642 million in the same period the previous year. Revenue fell 0.5 percent to US$19.6 billion, due to lower average selling prices. Volumes increased 1 percent to 21.1 million tonnes. Operating income recovered to US$477 million from US$55 million, with interest costs from the company’s US$17 billion debt burden the main reason for the net loss.
SPORTSWEAR
Strong euro hurts Adidas
Adidas said yesterday that the strong euro weighed on profits in the third quarter, but it is sticking to its full-year targets. “Our third-quarter performance was negatively impacted by severe currency headwinds,” among other factors, chief executive Herbert Hainer. In the third quarter, Adidas’ net profit fell by 8 percent to 316 million euros (US$427 million). Underlying or operating profit was down 6 percent at 463 million euros and revenue was down 7 percent at 3.879 billion euros.
HORMUZ ISSUE: The US president said he expected crude prices to drop at the end of the war, which he called a ‘minor excursion’ that could continue ‘for a little while’ The United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Kuwait started reducing oil production, as the near-closure of the crucial Strait of Hormuz ripples through energy markets and affects global supply. Abu Dhabi National Oil Co (ADNOC) is “managing offshore production levels to address storage requirements,” the company said in a statement, without giving details. Kuwait Petroleum Corp said it was lowering production at its oil fields and refineries after “Iranian threats against safe passage of ships through the Strait of Hormuz.” The war in the Middle East has all but closed Hormuz, the narrow waterway linking the Persian Gulf to the open seas,
Apple Inc increased iPhone production in India by about 53 percent last year and now makes a quarter of its marquee devices there, reflecting the US company’s efforts to avoid tariffs on China. The company assembled about 55 million iPhones in India last year, up from 36 million a year earlier, people familiar with the matter said, asking not to be named because the numbers aren’t public. Apple makes about 220 million to 230 million iPhones a year globally, with India’s share of the total increasing rapidly. Apple has accelerated its expansion in the world’s most populous country in recent years, bolstered
HEADWINDS: The company said it expects its computer business, as well as consumer electronics and communications segments to see revenue declines due to seasonality Pegatron Corp (和碩) yesterday said it aims to grow its artificial intelligence (AI) server revenue more than 10-fold this year from last year, driven by orders from neocloud solutions clients and large cloud service providers. The electronics manufacturing service provider said AI server revenue growth would be driven primarily by the Nvidia Corp GB300 server platform. Server shipments are expected to increase each quarter this year, with the second half likely to outperform the first half, it said. The AI server market is expected to broaden this year as more inference applications emerge, which would drive demand for system-on-chip, application-specific integrated circuits
PROJECTION: TSMC said it expects strong growth this year, with revenue in US dollars projected to grow by about 30 percent, outperforming the industry Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) yesterday reported consolidated sales last month reached NT$317.66 billion (US$9.98 billion), the highest ever for the month of February, driven by robust demand for chips built using the company’s advanced 3-nanometer (3nm) process. Last month’s figure was up 22.2 percent from a year earlier, but fell 20.8 percent from January, the world’s largest contract chipmaker said in a statement. For the first two months of the year, TSMC posted cumulative sales of NT$718.91 billion, up 29.9 percent from a year earlier. Analysts attributed the growth to sustained global demand for artificial intelligence (AI) products
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