ENERGY
China to maintain Iran trade
The US has been unable to persuade China to cut Iranian oil imports, two officials familiar with the negotiations said, dealing a blow to US President Donald Trump’s efforts to isolate the Islamic republic after his withdrawal from the 2015 nuclear accord. However, Beijing has agreed not to ramp up purchases of Iranian crude, the officials said. That would ease concerns that China would work to undermine US efforts to isolate Tehran by purchasing excess oil.
WATER
Hyflux looks to sell asset
Sembcorp Industries Ltd and Keppel Corp are among parties planning to study bids for Hyflux Ltd’s biggest asset, people with knowledge of the matter said, in a sale that is key to helping the cash-strapped company get back on its feet. Hyflux’s Tuaspring project, which includes Southeast Asia’s biggest desalination plant, has also drawn interest from Malaysian generator YTL Power International Bhd, the people said. The asset had a book value of S$1.47 billion (US$1.1 billion) at the end of March, Hyflux exchange filings showed.
AUTOMAKERS
Auto show to shift to June
The North American International Auto Show in Detroit, Michigan, considered for decades a key date on the global auto industry’s calendar, will soon be held every summer instead of in the winter. Beginning in 2020, the exhibition of car companies’ offerings would take place in June instead of January, the middle of the harsh Detroit winter, organizers said on Thursday. In recent years, major manufacturers have begun abandoning Detroit in favor of the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, which is also held in January.
REAL ESTATE
Vancouver sales take a dive
Vancouver realtors have not had this lousy a July in almost two decades. Sales were down 30 percent from a year ago to 2,070 units, the fewest transactions in the month since 2000, Real Estate Board of Greater Vancouver data released on Thursday showed. Sales of detached properties declined 33 percent from a year earlier, and apartments were down 27 percent. Detached homes sold for an average of C$1.61 million (US$1.24 million) and apartments averaged C$712,092.
INDIA
Rains should boost farming
The lifeblood of the country’s economy, the monsoon rains, should recover this month and next from below-average levels at the start of the season, the weather office said yesterday, supporting farm income and broader economic growth. The farming sector accounts for about 14 percent of the nation’s US$2 trillion economy and employs more than half of its 1.3 billion people.
AUTOMAKERS
Toyota hits record profit
Toyota Motor Corp yesterday reported that its quarterly profit climbed 7.2 percent in April to June to a record ￥657.3 billion (US$5.9 billion), exceeding analysts’ forecasts, thanks to strong sales in the US and other overseas markets. The company said that sales rose 4.5 percent to ￥7.4 trillion, also a record. With uncertainties prevailing over possible US tariff increases, the company kept its profit forecast for the full year unchanged at ￥2.12 trillion and trimmed its sales forecast to 8.9 million vehicles from the earlier estimated 8.95 million units.
ADVANCED: Previously, Taiwanese chip companies were restricted from building overseas fabs with technology less than two generations behind domestic factories Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), a major chip supplier to Nvidia Corp, would no longer be restricted from investing in next-generation 2-nanometer chip production in the US, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. However, the ministry added that the world’s biggest contract chipmaker would not be making any reckless decisions, given the weight of its up to US$30 billion investment. To safeguard Taiwan’s chip technology advantages, the government has barred local chipmakers from making chips using more advanced technologies at their overseas factories, in China particularly. Chipmakers were previously only allowed to produce chips using less advanced technologies, specifically
The New Taiwan dollar is on the verge of overtaking the yuan as Asia’s best carry-trade target given its lower risk of interest-rate and currency volatility. A strategy of borrowing the New Taiwan dollar to invest in higher-yielding alternatives has generated the second-highest return over the past month among Asian currencies behind the yuan, based on the Sharpe ratio that measures risk-adjusted relative returns. The New Taiwan dollar may soon replace its Chinese peer as the region’s favored carry trade tool, analysts say, citing Beijing’s efforts to support the yuan that can create wild swings in borrowing costs. In contrast,
TARIFF SURGE: The strong performance could be attributed to the growing artificial intelligence device market and mass orders ahead of potential US tariffs, analysts said The combined revenue of companies listed on the Taiwan Stock Exchange and the Taipei Exchange for the whole of last year totaled NT$44.66 trillion (US$1.35 trillion), up 12.8 percent year-on-year and hit a record high, data compiled by investment consulting firm CMoney showed on Saturday. The result came after listed firms reported a 23.92 percent annual increase in combined revenue for last month at NT$4.1 trillion, the second-highest for the month of December on record, and posted a 15.63 percent rise in combined revenue for the December quarter at NT$12.25 billion, the highest quarterly figure ever, the data showed. Analysts attributed the
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co’s (TSMC, 台積電) quarterly sales topped estimates, reinforcing investor hopes that the torrid pace of artificial intelligence (AI) hardware spending would extend into this year. The go-to chipmaker for Nvidia Corp and Apple Inc reported a 39 percent rise in December-quarter revenue to NT$868.5 billion (US$26.35 billion), based on calculations from monthly disclosures. That compared with an average estimate of NT$854.7 billion. The strong showing from Taiwan’s largest company bolsters expectations that big tech companies from Alphabet Inc to Microsoft Corp would continue to build and upgrade datacenters at a rapid clip to propel AI development. Growth accelerated for
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