SWEDEN
GDP could retreat by 4%
GDP is seen shrinking 4 percent this year as the economy slumps due to the COVID-19 outbreak, a plunge rivaling that experienced during the global financial crisis more than a decade ago, Minister of Finance Magdalena Andersson said yesterday. “We have a very serious economic situation, both in Sweden and globally,” she told reporters. “This is both a demand and supply shock that is spreading between countries.” The economy shrank 4.2 percent in 2009 from the previous year, the biggest decline in more than 50 years.
PUBLISHING
Gannett plans furloughs
Gannett Co, the largest US newspaper publisher, on Monday said that it was making unspecified furloughs and pay cuts for its staff in the latest sign of media turmoil from the coronavirus pandemic. A memo from Gannett chief executive officer Paul Bascobert said that he would forgo his salary and the executive team would take a 25 percent pay cut as part of the belt-tightening at the group, which includes the daily USA Today. The company declined to offer specifics on the cuts.
MARKETING
US firms halt salaries
On Monday, three days after US President Donald Trump signed a US$2 trillion stimulus into law, Kohl’s Corp, Macy’s Inc and Gap Inc joined a growing number of retailers in halting pay for much of their workforce, while preserving some benefits. With these furloughs, that brings the total number of employees who are out of a paycheck at major US chains to more than 500,000, data compiled by Bloomberg showed. The coronavirus outbreak caused initial jobless benefit claims to hit 3.3 million last week.
MARKETING
WPP pulls dividend, buyback
WPP PLC, the world’s biggest advertising company, said that it was pulling its dividend and share buyback, and withdrawing its guidance for this year after it saw an increasing number of cancellations from clients due to the coronavirus crisis. The group, which has sold multiple assets as part of a program to simplify the business, said that it had cash of ￡3 billion (US$3.7 billion) and total liquidity, including undrawn credit facilities, of ￡4.8 billion. It has also launched a review of its costs to protect profitability from a fall in revenue.
ENERGY
BP not retrenching staff
Oil major BP PLC would not cut jobs over the next three months, chief executive officer Bernard Looney said, even as the company seeks to reduce spending following an oil price crash. Looney on Friday wrote in a LinkedIn post that while there has been reduced demand for the industry’s products, the company’s response to the crisis “will not include making any BP staff redundant over the next three months.” London-based BP employs 73,000 people across several countries.
AUTOMAKERS
Hyundai plans trial center
Hyundai Motor Co is setting up an innovation center in Singapore to develop and test technology across the automotive supply chain, including trialing the manufacturing process for electric vehicles. Construction of the facility in Jurong Innovation District would be completed in the second half of 2022, the Seoul-based automaker said in a statement yesterday. The center would focus on future concepts that could be used globally, said Hyundai Motor, which is spending 20 trillion won (US$16 billion) by 2025 on new technology.
‘SWASTICAR’: Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s close association with Donald Trump has prompted opponents to brand him a ‘Nazi’ and resulted in a dramatic drop in sales Demonstrators descended on Tesla Inc dealerships across the US, and in Europe and Canada on Saturday to protest company chief Elon Musk, who has amassed extraordinary power as a top adviser to US President Donald Trump. Waving signs with messages such as “Musk is stealing our money” and “Reclaim our country,” the protests largely took place peacefully following fiery episodes of vandalism on Tesla vehicles, dealerships and other facilities in recent weeks that US officials have denounced as terrorism. Hundreds rallied on Saturday outside the Tesla dealership in Manhattan. Some blasted Musk, the world’s richest man, while others demanded the shuttering of his
ADVERSARIES: The new list includes 11 entities in China and one in Taiwan, which is a local branch of Chinese cloud computing firm Inspur Group The US added dozens of entities to a trade blacklist on Tuesday, the US Department of Commerce said, in part to disrupt Beijing’s artificial intelligence (AI) and advanced computing capabilities. The action affects 80 entities from countries including China, the United Arab Emirates and Iran, with the commerce department citing their “activities contrary to US national security and foreign policy.” Those added to the “entity list” are restricted from obtaining US items and technologies without government authorization. “We will not allow adversaries to exploit American technology to bolster their own militaries and threaten American lives,” US Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick said. The entities
Minister of Finance Chuang Tsui-yun (莊翠雲) yesterday told lawmakers that she “would not speculate,” but a “response plan” has been prepared in case Taiwan is targeted by US President Donald Trump’s reciprocal tariffs, which are to be announced on Wednesday next week. The Trump administration, including US Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent, has said that much of the proposed reciprocal tariffs would focus on the 15 countries that have the highest trade surpluses with the US. Bessent has referred to those countries as the “dirty 15,” but has not named them. Last year, Taiwan’s US$73.9 billion trade surplus with the US
Prices of gasoline and diesel products at domestic gas stations are to fall NT$0.2 and NT$0.1 per liter respectively this week, even though international crude oil prices rose last week, CPC Corp, Taiwan (台灣中油) and Formosa Petrochemical Corp (台塑石化) said yesterday. International crude oil prices continued rising last week, as the US Energy Information Administration reported a larger-than-expected drop in US commercial crude oil inventories, CPC said in a statement. Based on the company’s floating oil price formula, the cost of crude oil rose 2.38 percent last week from a week earlier, it said. News that US President Donald Trump plans a “secondary
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