SOUTH KOREA
Inflation slows down
Inflation eased more than expected last month in response to a cooling of energy prices that might prove temporary following OPEC+’s surprise weekend announcement of a cut in oil output. Consumer prices advanced 4.2 percent from a year earlier, slowing from February’s 4.8 percent and coming in below economists’ expected 4.3 percent, statistics office data showed yesterday. Core inflation, which excludes oil and agricultural prices, held at 4.8 percent, reflecting strong underlying price pressures in the economy. From the prior month, prices rose 0.2 percent, matching estimates.
RETAILERS
Walmart to cut jobs
Walmart Inc’s job cuts at five US e-commerce fulfillment centers would affect more than 2,000 positions, according to regulatory filings, although affected employees might find other roles at the company. The losses include more than 1,000 positions at a warehouse in Fort Worth, Texas, the state’s workforce commission said on Monday. The retail giant is also anticipating a reduction of almost 600 jobs at a Pennsylvania fulfillment center, 400 in Florida and about 200 in New Jersey. An additional reduction is planned in California. The net impact on total employment at Walmart, the largest private-sector employer in the US, remains uncertain.
DEVELOPERS
Evergrande announces deal
Chinese property developer Evergrande Group (恆大集團) said it has entered into a restructuring agreement with a group of international creditors, in what could be a breakthrough deal toward easing the developer’s massive debt. In a Hong Kong exchange filing made late on Monday, Evergrande said the group of creditors had entered into three separate restructuring schemes that involve a combination of new notes and bonds that can be converted into shares in two subsidiaries, Evergrande Property Services Group Ltd (恆大物業) and Evergrande New Energy Vehicle Group Ltd (恆大新能源汽車).
INVESTMENT
Snow Lake leaves Hong Kong
China-focused hedge-fund firm Snow Lake Capital Ltd (雪湖資本) has left Hong Kong after 12 years of operating in the territory, people familiar with the matter said. The company shuttered its office in Hong Kong last month, the people said. Founder and chief executive officer Sean Ma (馬自銘) has relocated to Menlo Park, California, for personal reasons. Its chief operating and financial officer is also based in the US city. All members of its Hong Kong-based research team moved to Beijing last month, the person said. In 2020, Snow Lake shot to international fame when it emerged as the author of a report released by Muddy Waters that exposed sales inflation at China’s Luckin Coffee Inc (瑞幸咖啡).
WEALTH MANAGEMENT
Investec enters deal
Investec PLC and Rathbones Group PLC have entered into a deal that would create a UK wealth manager with combined funds of ￡100 billion (US$124 billion). The asset managers have agreed to an all-share combination of Investec Wealth & Investment Ltd and Rathbones, a statement said yesterday. The enlarged Rathbones Group would remain an independent company operating under the Rathbones brand, with Investec as a long-term, strategic shareholder. After the deal closes, Investec Group is to own 41.25 percent of the economic interest in Rathbones’ share capital, but with voting rights limited to 29.9 percent, the statement said.
SECOND-RATE: Models distilled from US products do not perform the same as the original and undo measures that ensure the systems are neutral, the US’ cable said The US Department of State has ordered a global push to bring attention to what it said are widespread efforts by Chinese companies, including artificial intelligence (AI) start-up DeepSeek (深度求索), to steal intellectual property from US AI labs, according to a diplomatic cable. The cable, dated Friday and sent to diplomatic and consular posts around the world, instructs diplomatic staff to speak to their foreign counterparts about “concerns over adversaries’ extraction and distillation of US AI models.” Distillation is the process of training smaller AI models using output from larger, more expensive ones to lower the costs of training a powerful new
Micron Technology Inc is a driving force pushing the US Congress to pass legislation that would put new export restrictions on equipment its Chinese competitors use to make their chips, according to people familiar with the matter. A US House of Representatives panel yesterday was to vote on the “MATCH Act,” a bill designed to close gaps in restrictions on chipmaking equipment. It would also pressure foreign companies that sell equipment to Chinese chipmaking facilities to align with export curbs on US companies like Lam Research Corp and Applied Materials Inc. The bill targets facilities operated by China’s ChangXin Memory Technologies Inc
Singapore-based ride-hailing and delivery giant Grab Holdings’ planned acquisition of Foodpanda’s Taiwan operations has yet to enter the formal review stage, as regulators await supplementary documents, the Fair Trade Commission (FTC) said yesterday. Acting FTC Chairman Chen Chih-min (陳志民) told the legislature’s Economics Committee that although Grab submitted its application on March 27, the case has not been officially accepted because required materials remain incomplete. Once the filing is finalized, the FTC would launch a formal probe into the deal, focusing on issues such as cross-shareholding and potential restrictions on market competition, Chen told lawmakers. Grab last month announced that it would acquire
The artificial intelligence (AI) boom has triggered a seismic reshuffling of global equity markets, with Taiwan and South Korea muscling past European nations one by one. With its stock market now valued at nearly US$4.3 trillion, Taiwan surpassed the UK, Europe’s biggest market, earlier this month, data compiled by Bloomberg showed. South Korea is about US$140 billion away from doing the same. The tech-heavy Asian markets have shot past Germany and France in the past seven months. The shift is largely down to massive gains in shares of three companies that provide essential hardware for AI: Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電),
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