PHILIPPINES
Economy ‘on the mend’
The economy shrank for the third straight quarter in the July-to-September period, official data showed yesterday, but there were signs that activity was slowly picking up as COVID-19 restrictions eased and more businesses reopened. GDP fell 11.5 percent annually in the latest quarter, the Philippine Statistics Authority said. That was worse than the 9.6 percent contraction forecast by economists in a Bloomberg survey. However, it was smaller than the downwardly revised 16.9 percent fall in the April-to-June quarter. The narrower contraction in the latest period indicated that the economy was on the mend, Acting Socioeconomic Planning Secretary Karl Kendrick Chua said. “The path is clearer for a stronger bounce back in 2021,” Chua said.
SAUDI ARABIA
Economic contraction slows
The economy shrank 4.2 percent in the third quarter from a year earlier, government data showed yesterday, a smaller contraction than the second quarter, when the economy was reeling from COVID-19 lockdowns. The economy expanded by 1.2 percent on a seasonally adjusted quarter-on-quarter basis in the third quarter from a contraction of 4.9 percent in the previous quarter, the General Authority for Statistics said. The “flash estimates” for quarterly GDP did not have a breakdown on how the oil and non-oil sectors performed in the three-month period to the end of September.
AUTOMAKERS
GM to hire 3,000 workers
General Motors Co (GM) has said it would hire 3,000 more technical workers by early next year to help with virtual product testing and to develop software as a service. The automaker said it would offer more remote work opportunities to develop electric and autonomous vehicles. GM wants to hire electrical system and infotainment software engineers as well as developers for Java, Android, iOS and other platforms. Most of the jobs would be at its technical center in the Detroit suburb of Warren, Michigan, spokesman Stuart Fowle said. Others would be at GM data and technical centers in Phoenix; Austin, Texas; Oshawa, Ontario; and Atlanta.
ENTERTAINMENT
Disney expands furloughs
Walt Disney Co on Monday said that it was furloughing additional workers from its Disneyland theme park in Southern California, as it still does not know when the state will allow it to reopen because of the COVID-19 pandemic. The number of furloughs, which include executive, salaried and hourly workers, was not known. It comes on top of the 28,000 employees who were laid off in September, mostly across Disney’s US theme parks, in California and Florida. Disneyland, located in Anaheim, has been closed since mid-March.
AVIATION
Norwegian faces cash crunch
Pandemic-hit Norwegian Air Shuttle ASA could run out of cash in the first quarter of next year unless it secures fresh funding, the budget carrier said yesterday. The airline’s cash and cash equivalents stood at 3.4 billion kronor (US$376 million) at the end of September, down from 4.98 billion kronor at the end of June. The Norwegian government on Monday rejected a plea for more state support, arguing it was too risky, and the company soon after said it would furlough 1,600 more staff, leaving just 600 people still working, down from a pre-pandemic 10,000.
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
DOLLAR CHALLENGE: BRICS countries’ growing share of global GDP threatens the US dollar’s dominance, which some member states seek to displace for world trade US president-elect Donald Trump on Saturday threatened 100 percent tariffs against a bloc of nine nations if they act to undermine the US dollar. His threat was directed at countries in the so-called BRICS alliance, which consists of Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa, Egypt, Ethiopia, Iran and the United Arab Emirates. Turkey, Azerbaijan and Malaysia have applied to become members and several other countries have expressed interest in joining. While the US dollar is by far the most-used currency in global business and has survived past challenges to its preeminence, members of the alliance and other developing nations say they are fed
TECH COMPETITION: The US restricted sales of two dozen types of manufacturing equipment and three software tools, and blacklisted 140 more Chinese entities US President Joe Biden’s administration unveiled new restrictions on China’s access to vital components for chips and artificial intelligence (AI), escalating a campaign to contain Beijing’s technological ambitions. The US Department of Commerce slapped additional curbs on the sale of high-bandwidth memory (HBM) and chipmaking gear, including that produced by US firms at foreign facilities. It also blacklisted 140 more Chinese entities that it accused of acting on Beijing’s behalf, although it did not name them in an initial statement. Full details on the new sanctions and Entity List additions were to be published later yesterday, a US official said. The US “will
COLLABORATION: The operations center shows the close partnership between Taiwan and Japan in the field of semiconductors, Minister of Economic Affairs J.W. Kuo said Tokyo Electron Ltd, Asia’s biggest semiconductor equipment supplier, yesterday launched a NT$2 billion (US$61.5 million) operations center in Tainan as it aims to expand capacity and meet growing demand. Its new Taiwan Operations Center is expected to help customers release their products faster, boost production efficiency and shorten equipment repair time in a cost-effective way, the company said. The center is about a five-minute drive from the factories of its major customers such as Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co’s (TSMC, 台積電) advanced 3-nanometer and 2-nanometer fabs. The operations center would have about 1,000 employees when it is fully utilized, the company
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