Tue, Mar 15, 2022 page10

• World Business Quick Take

  • Agencies
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  INTERNET

  Kakao founder steps down

  Kakao Group founder Brian Kim has resigned from the board, relinquishing the reins after a series of scandals rocked the South Korean social media and fintech giant. Kim, the self-made billionaire who founded the nation’s top messaging app operator Kakao Corp, would now focus on global business expansion, his company said in an e-mailed statement yesterday. In January, news reports said that police were investigating allegations that Kim evaded nearly US$740 million taxes in 2014. That came on top of criticism from regulators that the Kakao group was fomenting a monopoly, as well as public outrage over the sale of stock by top executives after a unit’s successful public offering.

  FOOD AND BEVERAGE

  Canned food prices to jump

  Baked beans and tinned spaghetti are among about 100 Australian staple food items that are expected to be hit by price rises of as much as 20 percent, Robert Giles, chief executive officer of canned goods producer SPC, said in an interview with the Australian Financial Review. Giles told the newspaper that the company “had no choice” but to raise consumer prices to mitigate higher input costs, or potentially face going out of business. Surging prices for fuel, wheat and packaging — including cans — are among the company’s price pressures, he said.

  MINING

  Rio Tinto planning buyout

  Rio Tinto Group has offered to buy out Turquoise Hill Resources Ltd for US$2.7 billion in attempt to gain control of a giant copper mine it is developing in Mongolia. The world’s second-biggest mining company currently owns 51 percent of Turquoise Hill, which in turn holds a two-thirds share in the giant Oyu Tolgoi copper project in Mongolia. Rio Tinto’s flagship growth project has been a headache for the company as costs spiral and it dealt with long running disputes with the Mongolian government and Turquoise Hill.

  SRI LANKA

  IMF to discuss bailout

  An IMF delegation was yesterday in Sri Lanka to discuss the island’s worsening economic crisis, with the public suffering through months of food, fuel and medicine shortages. A lack of foreign currency has left traders unable to pay for vital imports in what authorities say is the South Asian nation’s worst financial crisis since independence from Britain in 1948. Sri Lanka’s government is divided on seeking a bailout, but the international lender said in a statement that it was “ready to discuss options if requested.”

  TELECOMS

  TIM to spin off assets

  Telecom Italia SpA (TIM) said that it is pushing ahead with an in-house plan to spin off its landline assets, even as it pledged to hear out KKR & Co on a preliminary offer to buy the troubled phone carrier. The company’s board said in a statement on Sunday that it remains committed to its own asset reorganization plan, which hinges on an eventual merger with smaller state-backed rival Open Fiber SpA. The Italian company offers “untapped value” that needs to be taken into account before evaluating options other than its own management’s, the statement said. Still, the carrier said its board voted unanimously to allow TIM chief executive officer Pietro Labriola and chairman Salvatore Rossi to proceed further in discussions with private equity giant KKR, it said.

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