KUWAIT
State plans to sell assets
Kuwait plans a new state-owned fund to manage as much as US$100 billion in local assets with the goal of selling them to private investors in five to seven years, al-Anba newspaper reported on Sunday. The new sovereign wealth fund would include local assets managed by the Kuwait Investment Authority, which has been burdened by its domestic mandate and would focus more on its international portfolio, al-Anba reported, citing unidentified officials. Stakes in local companies, as well as power and water projects, are to be included in the new fund, the newspaper said. The plan to privatize utilities while removing domestic energy subsidies is intended to make its power and water assets more profitable for the fund and attractive to potential investors, al-Anba said.
AGRICULTURE
Cocoa output faces decline
Nigeria’s cocoa midcrop output could decline by as much as 60 percent as prolonged dry weather takes a toll on the trees, the nation’s cocoa association said. “The heatwave is so severe now that flowers and buds are falling off cocoa trees in the farms,” Sayina Riman, president of the Cocoa Association of Nigeria, which groups farmers, traders and grinders, said by telephone from the southeastern cocoa hub of Ikom. “The 2016 midcrop may drop by about 60 percent as a result of the ravaging effect of the long harsh harmattan weather.” Farmers in the southwestern cocoa belt that accounts for about 70 percent of Nigeria’s production say the crop is not faring well.
COMMODITIES
Amplats reports big losses
Anglo American Platinum Ltd (Amplats) said it is to report a bigger-than-expected loss after the world’s largest producer of the metal reported impairments and write-offs amounting to 14 billion rand (US$848 million). The basic loss for last year is likely to be 12.1 billion rand to 12.2 billion rand, compared with earnings of 624 million rand a year earlier, the Johannesburg-based company said yesterday. The bulk of the loss is due to the carrying value of Amplats’ assets, it said. Post-tax restructuring costs of 850 million rand and implementing plans that led to a reduction in employees and contractors also contributed to the decline, Amplats said.
SINGAPORE
Decline extended again
Singapore’s consumer prices fell for a 14th straight month, extending the longest streak of declines in almost three decades. Consumer prices fell 0.6 percent from a year earlier last month, data released in Singapore yesterday showed. The median estimate in a Bloomberg News survey was for a 0.7 percent decline. Core inflation, which excludes private transport and accommodation costs, accelerated to 0.3 percent last month. “External sources of inflation are likely to remain muted,” the central bank and the Ministry of Trade and Industry said in a statement.
OBITURARY
Media General chair dies
Media General Inc chairman John Stewart Bryan III, the former publisher of the Richmond Times-Dispatch, has died. He was 77. The fourth and final generation of his family to work in the media business, Bryan died on Saturday, the Times-Dispatch editor Paige Mudd said. He had suffered a fall at his home on Jan. 15 and had been hospitalized since then. Bryan’s death comes amid a bidding contest between Nexstar Broadcasting Group Inc of Texas and Iowa’s Meredith Corp to merge with Media General.
EXTRATERRITORIAL REACH: China extended its legal jurisdiction to ban some dual-use goods of Chinese origin from being sold to the US, even by third countries Beijing has set out to extend its domestic laws across international borders with a ban on selling some goods to the US that applies to companies both inside and outside China. The new export control rules are China’s first attempt to replicate the extraterritorial reach of US and European sanctions by covering Chinese products or goods with Chinese parts in them. In an announcement this week, China declared it is banning the sale of dual-use items to the US military and also the export to the US of materials such as gallium and germanium. Companies and people overseas would be subject to
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) founder Morris Chang (張忠謀) yesterday said that Intel Corp would find itself in the same predicament as it did four years ago if its board does not come up with a core business strategy. Chang made the remarks in response to reporters’ questions about the ailing US chipmaker, once an archrival of TSMC, during a news conference in Taipei for the launch of the second volume of his autobiography. Intel unexpectedly announced the immediate retirement of former chief executive officer Pat Gelsinger last week, ending his nearly four-year tenure and ending his attempts to revive the
WORLD DOMINATION: TSMC’s lead over second-placed Samsung has grown as the latter faces increased Chinese competition and the end of clients’ product life cycles Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) retained the No. 1 title in the global pure-play wafer foundry business in the third quarter of this year, seeing its market share growing to 64.9 percent to leave South Korea’s Samsung Electronics Co, the No. 2 supplier, further behind, Taipei-based TrendForce Corp (集邦科技) said in a report. TSMC posted US$23.53 billion in sales in the July-September period, up 13.0 percent from a quarter earlier, which boosted its market share to 64.9 percent, up from 62.3 percent in the second quarter, the report issued on Monday last week showed. TSMC benefited from the debut of flagship
TENSE TIMES: Formosa Plastics sees uncertainty surrounding the incoming Trump administration in the US, geopolitical tensions and China’s faltering economy Formosa Plastics Group (台塑集團), Taiwan’s largest industrial conglomerate, yesterday posted overall revenue of NT$118.61 billion (US$3.66 billion) for last month, marking a 7.2 percent rise from October, but a 2.5 percent fall from one year earlier. The group has mixed views about its business outlook for the current quarter and beyond, as uncertainty builds over the US power transition and geopolitical tensions. Formosa Plastics Corp (台灣塑膠), a vertically integrated supplier of plastic resins and petrochemicals, reported a monthly uptick of 15.3 percent in its revenue to NT$18.15 billion, as Typhoon Kong-rey postponed partial shipments slated for October and last month, it said. The
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