BANKING
Flight MH17 cards stolen
Dutch banks said on Saturday they were taking “preventative measures” after reports of credit cards being looted from the Ukrainian crash site of Malaysia Airlines flight MH17, where 192 Dutch citizens died. “International media report that victims’ bank cards have been stolen,” the Dutch Banking Association said in a statement “Banks are taking preventative measures as necessary,” it said, adding that any losses suffered by relatives of the dead would be paid back. Malaysia Airlines flight MH17 came down in rebel-held eastern Ukraine on Thursday with 298 people on board. The area has been under the control of Russian-backed separatists since the crash, preventing international investigators from gaining access.
FINANCE
American Apparel survives
American Apparel took another step away from a financial precipice this week when an investment firm bought a US$10 million loan that had threatened to set off a string of defaults. The loan, made by the British private equity firm Lion Capital, included a provision that said the loan would be in default if American Apparel’s founder, Dov Charney, was no longer its chief executive. That loan was then tied to another, larger line of credit with Capital One, meaning that if the Lion loan was in default, the Capital One loan could soon be as well. Charney was forced out of the chief executive position by American Apparel’s board of directors last month. Since then, American Apparel and Lion Capital have been involved in an unusually public battle over the future of the loan, which carries an interest rate of 20 percent.
MANUFACTURING
GE plans Puerto Rico plants
General Electric Co plans to open an estimated US$20 million plant along Puerto Rico’s north coast while closing two other plants in the US territory. Puerto Rico’s Industrial Development Company says construction is set to begin this year on the facility to produce molded case circuit breakers. The plant is expected to start operating in the middle of next year. The company said on Friday it would phase out operations at its plants in San German and Vega Baja by the end of next year. Information on how the changes would affect jobs was not announced. The US territory of 3.67 million people is seeking to create more jobs and expand its manufacturing sector as it struggles to emerge from a nearly decade-long economic slump. Its 13.1 percent unemployment rate is far higher than that of any US state.
PUBLIC RELATIONS
Apple talks to Jay Carney
Apple Inc has talked with former White House press secretary Jay Carney about a public-relations job, a friend of his said. Carney declined to specify whether he’s talking to Apple or any other specific company. “I am talking to a lot of different people about a variety of potential opportunities,” he said yesterday in an e-mail. Apple has been seeking a successor to Katie Cotton, the company’s longtime vice president for worldwide communications, who announced her departure in May. Carney, 49, would give the maker of the iPhone a high-profile public face. A former Washington bureau chief for Time magazine, Carney joined US President Barack Obama’s administration as the first communications director for Vice President Joe Biden. He took over the briefing-room podium when Robert Gibbs resigned as press secretary in February 2011. He left the job last month and was succeeded by Josh Earnest.
ISSUES: Gogoro has been struggling with ballooning losses and was recently embroiled in alleged subsidy fraud, using Chinese-made components instead of locally made parts Gogoro Inc (睿能創意), the nation’s biggest electric scooter maker, yesterday said that its chairman and CEO Horace Luke (陸學森) has resigned amid chronic losses and probes into the company’s alleged involvement in subsidy fraud. The board of directors nominated Reuntex Group (潤泰集團) general counsel Tamon Tseng (曾夢達) as the company’s new chairman, Gogoro said in a statement. Ruentex is Gogoro’s biggest stakeholder. Gogoro Taiwan general manager Henry Chiang (姜家煒) is to serve as acting CEO during the interim period, the statement said. Luke’s departure came as a bombshell yesterday. As a company founder, he has played a key role in pushing for the
China has claimed a breakthrough in developing homegrown chipmaking equipment, an important step in overcoming US sanctions designed to thwart Beijing’s semiconductor goals. State-linked organizations are advised to use a new laser-based immersion lithography machine with a resolution of 65 nanometers or better, the Chinese Ministry of Industry and Information Technology (MIIT) said in an announcement this month. Although the note does not specify the supplier, the spec marks a significant step up from the previous most advanced indigenous equipment — developed by Shanghai Micro Electronics Equipment Group Co (SMEE, 上海微電子) — which stood at about 90 nanometers. MIIT’s claimed advances last
CROSS-STRAIT TENSIONS: The US company could switch orders from TSMC to alternative suppliers, but that would lower chip quality, CEO Jensen Huang said Nvidia Corp CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳), whose products have become the hottest commodity in the technology world, on Wednesday said that the scramble for a limited amount of supply has frustrated some customers and raised tensions. “The demand on it is so great, and everyone wants to be first and everyone wants to be most,” he told the audience at a Goldman Sachs Group Inc technology conference in San Francisco. “We probably have more emotional customers today. Deservedly so. It’s tense. We’re trying to do the best we can.” Huang’s company is experiencing strong demand for its latest generation of chips, called
GLOBAL ECONOMY: Policymakers have a choice of a small 25 basis-point cut or a bold cut of 50 basis points, which would help the labor market, but might reignite inflation The US Federal Reserve is gearing up to announce its first interest rate cut in more than four years on Wednesday, with policymakers expected to debate how big a move to make less than two months before the US presidential election. Senior officials at the US central bank including Fed Chairman Jerome Powell have in recent weeks indicated that a rate cut is coming this month, as inflation eases toward the bank’s long-term target of two percent, and the labor market continues to cool. The Fed, which has a dual mandate from the US Congress to act independently to ensure
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