JAPAN
Household spending rises
Households boosted spending in October for a second straight month, despite accelerating inflation and falling real wages, marking a better-than-expected start to the final quarter of the year. Outlays rose 1.1 percent from September, led by gains in clothing and entertainment, the Ministry of Internal Affairs reported yesterday. Spending increased 1.2 percent from a year earlier, more than the increase forecast by analysts. The solid spending data suggest some resilience in the country’s recovery path. Economists forecast that the economy would begin to grow again this quarter, pushed up by private sector spending and services consumption. A travel subsidy program for residents and the reopening of the nation’s borders to international visitors have boosted demand for tourism, resulting in airline operator ANA Holdings’s 91 percent upward revision of its net income view for this fiscal year.
BEVERAGES
PepsiCo to slash jobs
PepsiCo Inc is laying off headquarters workers from its North American snack and beverage units, the Wall Street Journal reported on Monday, in a sign that corporate reductions are beginning to extend beyond technology and media companies. The company is to dismiss hundreds of employees, the report said, citing an internal memo. PepsiCo described the layoffs as intended to “simplify” the organization, the Journal said. PepsiCo spokespeople did not immediately respond to requests for comment. Even though it is paying more for commodities such as sugar, corn and potatoes, and passing those higher prices on to consumers, the maker of Frito-Lay chips, Mountain Dew soft drinks and Quaker Oats cereals has said that demand for its products remains strong.
GERMANY
Industrial orders recover
Industrial orders rebounded slightly in October, official data showed yesterday, adding to hopes that an economic slowdown caused by Russia’s war in Ukraine and soaring energy prices might not be as bad as feared. New orders, which provide a foretaste of industrial output in Europe’s largest economy, inched up 0.8 percent on the previous month, federal statistics agency Destatis said. The small uptick follows two months of steep falls, and was mainly due to a strong recovery in orders from abroad. Domestic orders declined month-on-month. The October bounce in factory orders, alongside recent surveys showing improved business confidence, is “a further indication that the recession may be weaker than feared,” the Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development said in a statement.
CRYTOCURRENCIES
Goldman eyes crypto firms
Goldman Sachs plans to spend tens of millions of US dollars to buy or invest in crypto companies after the collapse of the FTX exchange hit valuations and dampened investor interest. FTX’s implosion has heightened the need for more trustworthy, regulated cryptocurrency players, and big banks see an opportunity to pick up business, said Mathew McDermott, Goldman’s head of digital assets. Goldman is doing due diligence on a number of different crypto firms, he added, without giving details. “We do see some really interesting opportunities, priced much more sensibly,” McDermott said in an interview last month. FTX on Nov. 11 filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection in the US after its dramatic collapse, sparking fears of contagion and amplifying calls for more crypto regulation.
Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi has talked up the benefits of a weaker yen in a campaign speech, adopting a tone at odds with her finance ministry, which has refused to rule out any options to counter excessive foreign exchange volatility. Takaichi later softened her stance, saying she did not have a preference for the yen’s direction. “People say the weak yen is bad right now, but for export industries, it’s a major opportunity,” Takaichi said on Saturday at a rally for Liberal Democratic Party candidate Daishiro Yamagiwa in Kanagawa Prefecture ahead of a snap election on Sunday. “Whether it’s selling food or
CONCERNS: Tech companies investing in AI businesses that purchase their products have raised questions among investors that they are artificially propping up demand Nvidia Corp chief executive officer Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) on Saturday said that the company would be participating in OpenAI’s latest funding round, describing it as potentially “the largest investment we’ve ever made.” “We will invest a great deal of money,” Huang told reporters while visiting Taipei. “I believe in OpenAI. The work that they do is incredible. They’re one of the most consequential companies of our time.” Huang did not say exactly how much Nvidia might contribute, but described the investment as “huge.” “Let Sam announce how much he’s going to raise — it’s for him to decide,” Huang said, referring to OpenAI
CHIP HANG-UP: Surging memorychip prices would deal a blow to smartphone sales this year, potentially hindering one of MediaTek’s biggest sources of revenue MediaTek Inc (聯發科), the world’s biggest smartphone chip designer, yesterday said its new artificial intelligence (AI) chips used in data centers are to account for 20 percent of its total revenue next year, as cloud service providers race to deploy AI infrastructure to meet voracious demand. MediaTek is believed to be developing tensor processing units for Google, which are used in AI applications. While it did not confirm such reports, MediaTek said its new application-specific IC (ASIC) business would be a new growth engine for the company. It again hiked its forecast for the addressable ASIC market to US$70 billion by 2028, compared
SIGNS OF STABILITY: With US tariff risks to GDP subsiding, reliable economic conditions are expected to reinforce the bank operating environment, Fitch said Fitch Ratings has upgraded the outlook for Taiwan’s banking sector to “neutral” from “deteriorating,” citing a tariff agreement with the US that has reduced uncertainty in Taiwan’s macroeconomic environment and stabilized financial performance. The US on Jan. 15 agreed to lower tariffs on Taiwanese goods from 20 percent to 15 percent, without stacking them on existing most-favored-nation rates, placing Taiwan on equal footing with major competitors such as Japan, South Korea and the EU. The deal also grants Taiwan-made semiconductors and related products most-favorable-nation treatment under Section 232 of the US Trade Expansion Act. Under the agreement, Taiwanese semiconductor, electronics manufacturing service, artificial
RSS