TURKEY
Lira falls to record low
The lira on Monday dropped to record lows after President Recep Tayyip Erdogan over the weekend ordered the expulsion of the ambassadors of 10 countries, including Germany and the US. The envoys had angered the president in calling for the release of Parisian-born philanthropist and activist Osman Kavala, who has been in prison since 2017 without a conviction. The lira fell to 9.80 against the US dollar before rallying slightly to 9.73, a drop of 1.3 percent from the previous day. The lira has fallen about 24 percent against the US dollar since the start of the year.
JAPAN
Japan Post to issue shares
The government said that it plans to sell ¥843 billion (US$7.42 billion) of shares in Japan Post Holdings Co in the ongoing privatization of the postal and financial-services giant six years after its initial public offering. The price of Japan Post’s secondary share sale was set at ¥820.6 per share, marking a 2 percent discount on Monday’s closing price of ¥837.4. The government is offloading about 1 billion shares to Japanese and overseas investors, and the company also plans to buy back up to ¥100 billion in shares, or 3.5 percent of the outstanding amount.
CHINA
Economic forecast cut
The country’s economy next year is likely to expand 5.2 percent, down from a previous projection of 5.6 percent, as the government sticks to its long-term policy objectives, such as reducing property debt, Goldman Sachs Group Inc said. Weaker GDP growth and faster inflation in the third quarter were policy-driven and likely temporary, with Goldman expecting a sequential pickup in growth in the fourth quarter, a note said yesterday. On an annual basis, growth this quarter is expected to slow to 3.1 percent, it said. “The long-term policy direction, such as property deleveraging, remains unchanged as evidenced by the latest news on starting property tax trials in select cities,” Goldman said.
TECHNOLOGY
Pinterest deal fizzles out
PayPal Holdings Inc yesterday said that it is not pursuing an acquisition of Pinterest Inc, ending days of speculation over a potential US$45 billion deal. PayPal had approached Pinterest about a potential deal, Bloomberg News reported last week. The companies discussed a price of about US$70 per share, people with knowledge of the matter said, a price that would have valued Pinterest at about US$45 billion. “In response to market rumors regarding a potential acquisition of Pinterest by PayPal, PayPal stated that it is not pursuing an acquisition of Pinterest at this time,” the firm said in a one-sentence statement.
FOOD SAFETY
Biscuit shares slide
Shares of Hup Seng Industries Bhd had their biggest intraday drop in 19 months, following findings by Hong Kong’s consumer watchdog that cancer-causing substances were detected in biscuits and crackers, including those made by the Malaysian company. The stock slid as much as 3.9 percent, the most since March last year, and was traded at 87.5 sen at 3:55pm in Kuala Lumpur. The Hong Kong Consumer Council last week announced that 60 samples of the pre-packed biscuits and crackers that it tested contained cancer-inducing elements, such as glycidol or acrylamide. The council also found that 40 percent of the products analyzed had misleading nutrition labels.
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
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],”
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
Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 0.7 percent and 13.6 percent respectively from a year earlier, setting record highs for the month of March, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Sales in the wholesale sector also grew last month by 4.6 annually, mainly due to the business opportunities for emerging applications related to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing technologies, the ministry said in a report. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales this month would retain their growth momentum as the former would benefit from Tomb Sweeping Day