LATIN AMERICA
Investment tipped to fall
Foreign direct investment in the region would fall by between 45 percent and 55 percent this year due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the UN Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean said on Wednesday. The figures represent the world’s “most pronounced” regional decline, said the report, which was released at the commission’s headquarters in Santiago, Chile. Regional investment reached US$160.7 billion last year, 7.8 percent less than in 2018, a negative trend “that will become more acute in 2020” — mainly as a result of the pandemic, commission executive secretary Alicia Barcena said.
AIRLINES
Norwegian seeks relief
Norwegian Air Shuttle ASA yesterday proposed a package of debt conversion, aircraft divestment and sale of new equity in a bid to overcome the effects of the pandemic, which have brought the company to the brink of collapse. As part of the plan, the Oslo-based carrier aims to raise up to 4 billion Norwegian kroner (US$455.4 million) from the sale of new shares or hybrid instruments, it said. Only six of the company’s 140 aircraft are in use, while the remaining 134 are grounded.
BANKING
Macquarie strikes deal
Macquarie Group Ltd has struck a US$1.7 billion deal to buy Waddell & Reed Financial Inc and expand its US asset management business, in chief executive Shemara Wikramanayake’s biggest move since taking charge two years ago. The acquisition adds Waddell & Reed’s US$68 billion asset management unit to Macquarie’s US investment management arm, propelling it into the top 25 actively managed, long-term, open-ended mutual fund managers, and giving it the size and scale to compete with larger rivals, the Sydney-based bank said in a statement yesterday.
BANKING
Affin considers IPO
Affin Bank Bhd is considering an initial public offering (IPO) of its asset management unit that could raise about 500 million ringgit (US$123 million), people familiar with the matter said. The Malaysian lender is working with advisers on the potential listing for Affin Hwang Asset Management Bhd in Kuala Lumpur as soon as the second half of next year, the people said.
RETAILERS
J Sainsbury forgoes break
J Sainsbury PLC said that it is forgoing UK tax relief because its outlook for earnings has improved as grocery demand remains strong during pandemic lockdowns. Sales and profit have been stronger than expected, particularly since the start of the second national lockdowns, and the company forecast adjusted pretax earnings of at least £270 million (US$362 million) in the year to March. The company said that it is forgoing about £410 million of business rates relief this fiscal year and it would prioritize the use of excess cash for dividends.
FAST FOOD
Frank Carney dies
Frank Carney, who with his brother started the Pizza Hut empire in Wichita, Kansas, died on Wednesday from pneumonia. He was 82. Carney had recently recovered from COVID-19, but had Alzheimer’s disease for more than a decade, the Wichita Eagle reported. He died at 4:30am at an assisted living facility in Wichita, his wife and brother told the newspaper.
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
TRANSFORMATION: Taiwan is now home to the largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, thanks to the nation’s economic policies President Tsai Ing-wen (蔡英文) yesterday attended an event marking the opening of Google’s second hardware research and development (R&D) office in Taiwan, which was held at New Taipei City’s Banciao District (板橋). This signals Taiwan’s transformation into the world’s largest Google hardware research and development center outside of the US, validating the nation’s economic policy in the past eight years, she said. The “five plus two” innovative industries policy, “six core strategic industries” initiative and infrastructure projects have grown the national industry and established resilient supply chains that withstood the COVID-19 pandemic, Tsai said. Taiwan has improved investment conditions of the domestic economy
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”
MAJOR BENEFICIARY: The company benefits from TSMC’s advanced packaging scarcity, given robust demand for Nvidia AI chips, analysts said ASE Technology Holding Co (ASE, 日月光投控), the world’s biggest chip packaging and testing service provider, yesterday said it is raising its equipment capital expenditure budget by 10 percent this year to expand leading-edge and advanced packing and testing capacity amid strong artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing chip demand. This is on top of the 40 to 50 percent annual increase in its capital spending budget to more than the US$1.7 billion to announced in February. About half of the equipment capital expenditure would be spent on leading-edge and advanced packaging and testing technology, the company said. ASE is considered by analysts