CONGLOMERATES
HNA selling Swissport
HNA Group Co (海航集團) is in advanced talks to sell its Swiss airport-cargo handler to a Canadian asset manager, people familiar with the matter said, in what could be the debt-laden Chinese conglomerate’s biggest disposal since it unloaded its Hilton Worldwide Holdings Inc stake in April. Toronto-based Brookfield Asset Management Inc has emerged as the preferred bidder for Swissport International, the people said. Swissport — which also offers ticketing, cabin cleaning and aircraft maintenance — could fetch more than US$3 billion, the people said.
CRYPTOCURRENCIES
BK Global ups BTC stake
A group led by plastic surgeon and start-up investor Kim Byung-gun is boosting its bet on Bithumb, one of South Korea’s largest cryptocurrency exchanges. Kim’s BK Global Consortium signed a deal to buy 50 percent plus one share of BTC Holding Co, the largest investor in Bithumb’s operator, for about 400 billion won (US$352 million), according to a spokesperson for the trading platform. BK Global Consortium was already the fifth-largest shareholder of BTC Holding.
ENERGY
Shell to sell Venezuela JV
Royal Dutch Shell PLC is negotiating the sale of its stake in a Venezuelan oil joint venture (JV) to Paris-based Maurel & Prom, three sources said this week, a move to scale down its crude business in the ailing OPEC member country to focus on gas. The Anglo-Dutch company is seeking to sell its 40 percent stake in Petroregional del Lago, a joint venture with Venezuela’s state-run oil company PDVSA in the western state of Zulia near Colombia.
FINANCE
UOB mulls insurance ops
Singapore’s United Overseas Bank Ltd (UOB) is reviewing its insurance business, including an existing partnership with Prudential PLC, people familiar with the matter said. UOB has been soliciting ideas from potential advisers regarding its life insurance tie-up with Prudential, including ways to get more value out of the operations, the people said. Possibilities include renewing its agreement with the London-based insurer, which started in 2010, or looking for another partner, the people said.
SOUTH KOREA
Jobless rate declines
South Korea’s unemployment rate fell last month, recovering from an eight-year high in August, as increased fiscal spending in the healthcare sector boosted jobs even as manufacturers and retailers shed workers. The unemployment rate fell to 4 percent last month from 4.2 percent in seasonally adjusted terms, as the number of employed rose by 45,000 people from a year earlier, marking the biggest increase since June, a Statistics Korea report showed yesterday. The number of people with jobs increased by 137,000 last month from a year earlier, the report showed.
METALS
Pampa challenges SQM sale
The controlling shareholder in Chile’s lithium producer SQM has mounted a legal challenge to halt the sale of nearly a quarter of the company to Chinese group Tianqi Lithium Corp (天齊鋰業). Pampa Calichera, Potasios de Chile and Global Mining — collectively known as the Pampa Group, which holds 29.12 percent of SQM — said the decision by Chilean regulators to allow the deal breaks competition rules. Tianqi already has interests in Albermarle, the world’s largest lithium producer and a direct competitor of SQM.
Hon Hai Precision Industry Co (鴻海精密) yesterday said that its research institute has launched its first advanced artificial intelligence (AI) large language model (LLM) using traditional Chinese, with technology assistance from Nvidia Corp. Hon Hai, also known as Foxconn Technology Group (富士康科技集團), said the LLM, FoxBrain, is expected to improve its data analysis capabilities for smart manufacturing, and electric vehicle and smart city development. An LLM is a type of AI trained on vast amounts of text data and uses deep learning techniques, particularly neural networks, to process and generate language. They are essential for building and improving AI-powered servers. Nvidia provided assistance
STILL HOPEFUL: Delayed payment of NT$5.35 billion from an Indian server client sent its earnings plunging last year, but the firm expects a gradual pickup ahead Asustek Computer Inc (華碩), the world’s No. 5 PC vendor, yesterday reported an 87 percent slump in net profit for last year, dragged by a massive overdue payment from an Indian cloud service provider. The Indian customer has delayed payment totaling NT$5.35 billion (US$162.7 million), Asustek chief financial officer Nick Wu (吳長榮) told an online earnings conference. Asustek shipped servers to India between April and June last year. The customer told Asustek that it is launching multiple fundraising projects and expected to repay the debt in the short term, Wu said. The Indian customer accounted for less than 10 percent to Asustek’s
‘DECENT RESULTS’: The company said it is confident thanks to an improving world economy and uptakes in new wireless and AI technologies, despite US uncertainty Pegatron Corp (和碩) yesterday said it plans to build a new server manufacturing factory in the US this year to address US President Donald Trump’s new tariff policy. That would be the second server production base for Pegatron in addition to the existing facilities in Taoyuan, the iPhone assembler said. Servers are one of the new businesses Pegatron has explored in recent years to develop a more balanced product lineup. “We aim to provide our services from a location in the vicinity of our customers,” Pegatron president and chief executive officer Gary Cheng (鄭光治) told an online earnings conference yesterday. “We
LEAK SOURCE? There would be concern over the possibility of tech leaks if TSMC were to form a joint venture to operate Intel’s factories, an analyst said Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) yesterday stayed mum after a report said that the chipmaker has pitched chip designers Nvidia Corp, Advanced Micro Devices Inc and Broadcom Inc about taking a stake in a joint venture to operate Intel Corp’s factories. Industry sources told the Central News Agency (CNA) that the possibility of TSMC proposing to operate Intel’s wafer fabs is low, as the Taiwanese chipmaker has always focused on its core business. There is also concern over possible technology leaks if TSMC were to form a joint venture to operate Intel’s factories, Concord Securities Co (康和證券) analyst Kerry Huang (黃志祺)
RSS