SPORTSWEAR
Nike to buy RTFKT
Nike Inc is acquiring a virtual collectibles company as it dives further into the metaverse. The sportswear giant agreed to buy RTFKT, a business founded last year that creates digital products such as sneakers and uses blockchain technology to ensure authenticity, it said in a statement on Monday. Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. “Our plan is to invest in the RTFKT brand, serve and grow their innovative and creative community and extend Nike’s digital footprint and capabilities,” CEO John Donahoe said in the statement. Nike has been plotting its digital future in the past few months. It filed seven requests with the US Patent and Trademark Office in late October to protect its marks in “downloadable virtual goods” and related services.
UNITED KINGDOM
Jobs growth hits record
Employers added a record number of staff last month, adding to signs that the labor market withstood the end of the government’s furlough scheme and underscoring the Bank of England’s dilemma as it meets on interest rates this week. Figures from Britain’s tax office showed 257,000 people were added to company payrolls last month, the most since records began in 2014. “With still no sign of the end of the furlough scheme hitting the number of jobs, the total of employees on payroll continued to grow strongly in November,” Office for National Statistics (ONS) director of economic statistics Darren Morgan said. He cautioned that the figures could include people recently made redundant, but still working out their notice. Much of the recent growth in employment was among part-time workers, the ONS said. The payrolls data, provided by Britain’s tax office, showed October’s increase was slashed to 74,000 from an originally reported 160,000.
CANADA
Inflation target renewed
The Bank of Canada has retained its 2 percent inflation target for the next five years, but has formally been given license to moderately overshoot it to “support maximum sustainable employment.” In a mandate renewal released jointly with the government on Monday, the government directed the central bank to use monetary policy to boost employment levels as long as those efforts do not jeopardize the broader objective of stable prices. The move effectively gives Bank of Canada Governor Tiff Macklem more latitude to keep interest rates lower than what they would have been had the focus remained on the inflation number. Since the 1990s, the goal has been to keep inflation within 1 to 3 percent as much as possible. Operationally, that has meant aiming for a 2 percent target over the Bank of Canada’s forecast horizon, a period of about two years.
INDIA
Wholesale prices rise 14.2%
Wholesale prices rose 14.2 percent last month from a year earlier, the fastest pace in three decades on input costs fueled by high commodity prices and supply constraints, Ministry of Commerce data showed yesterday. That was faster than the median estimate of a 12 percent gain in a Bloomberg survey of 19 economists, and is the highest level since December 1991, when it came in at 14.3 percent. Factory-gate inflation has stayed in double digits this fiscal year, which began in April, as companies pay more for raw materials amid a rally in global commodity prices and a supply crunch. The spike “has come as a shock,” said Aditi Nayar, chief economist at ICRA Ltd. Most non-core categories displayed “an inflation rate that was much steeper than expected,” she said.
KEEPING UP: The acquisition of a cleanroom in Taiwan would enable Micron to increase production in a market where demand continues to outpace supply, a Micron official said Micron Technology Inc has signed a letter of intent to buy a fabrication site in Taiwan from Powerchip Semiconductor Manufacturing Corp (力積電) for US$1.8 billion to expand its production of memory chips. Micron would take control of the P5 site in Miaoli County’s Tongluo Township (銅鑼) and plans to ramp up DRAM production in phases after the transaction closes in the second quarter, the company said in a statement on Saturday. The acquisition includes an existing 12 inch fab cleanroom of 27,871m2 and would further position Micron to address growing global demand for memory solutions, the company said. Micron expects the transaction to
Vincent Wei led fellow Singaporean farmers around an empty Malaysian plot, laying out plans for a greenhouse and rows of leafy vegetables. What he pitched was not just space for crops, but a lifeline for growers struggling to make ends meet in a city-state with high prices and little vacant land. The future agriculture hub is part of a joint special economic zone launched last year by the two neighbors, expected to cost US$123 million and produce 10,000 tonnes of fresh produce annually. It is attracting Singaporean farmers with promises of cheaper land, labor and energy just over the border.
US actor Matthew McConaughey has filed recordings of his image and voice with US patent authorities to protect them from unauthorized usage by artificial intelligence (AI) platforms, a representative said earlier this week. Several video clips and audio recordings were registered by the commercial arm of the Just Keep Livin’ Foundation, a non-profit created by the Oscar-winning actor and his wife, Camila, according to the US Patent and Trademark Office database. Many artists are increasingly concerned about the uncontrolled use of their image via generative AI since the rollout of ChatGPT and other AI-powered tools. Several US states have adopted
A proposed billionaires’ tax in California has ignited a political uproar in Silicon Valley, with tech titans threatening to leave the state while California Governor Gavin Newsom of the Democratic Party maneuvers to defeat a levy that he fears would lead to an exodus of wealth. A technology mecca, California has more billionaires than any other US state — a few hundred, by some estimates. About half its personal income tax revenue, a financial backbone in the nearly US$350 billion budget, comes from the top 1 percent of earners. A large healthcare union is attempting to place a proposal before
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