REAL ESTATE
Australia mulls mortgages
Australia could further curb mortgage lending to investors as the effects of earlier measures wane and Sydney and Melbourne house prices keep surging, Reserve Bank of Australia Assistant Governor Michele Bullock said. “There is no doubt that the actions did address some of the risks,” Bullock said in a Bloomberg Address in Sydney. “While the resilience of both borrowers and lenders has no doubt improved, the initial effects on credit and some other indicators we use to assess risk may fade over time. We are continuing to monitor their ongoing effects and are prepared to do more if needed.” Bullock said that while individual decisions by banks might appear reasonable, regulators’ concern is that together they could lower overall lending standards. The backdrop is one where Sydney house prices have rocketed 105 percent since the start of 2009 and Melbourne’s have also soared.
REAL ESTATE
Investment funds fall
The amount of money available for property investment globally has fallen on an annual basis for the first time since 2011, led by Europe, as the amount of debt on offer diminishes, a report published yesterday by broker Cushman & Wakefield Inc said. Lenders are prepared to offer less credit than before, particularly on riskier properties, the report said. A total of US$435 billion of newly raised equity and debt is available to invest in commercial real estate, 2 percent less than a year ago, Cushman said. For the first time the equity targeting real-estate investments in the Americas exceeded Europe, the Middle East and Africa, as a result of the US dollar’s strength, the report said. Investors had consistently allocated more money to real estate since emerging from the global financial crisis as low interest rates diminished returns from government and corporate debt. Rising US interest rates and political uncertainty have now stemmed that tide.
FUEL STATIONS
Glencore linked to Mexico
Glencore PLC is entering the fuel-stations business in Mexico with a 15-year supply deal and a US$200 million investment in a joint venture with local owners, people familiar with the decision said. The agreement is the first significant move for Glencore in the retail fuel sector. Glencore is to supply 180,000 barrels of gasoline and diesel per day to 1,400 stations, about 10 percent of the country’s total, the people said, asking not to be named because the deal has not been announced. The move came after Mexico ended a long-standing monopoly by its state-controlled energy company and last month boosted gasoline prices to aid distributors.
SOCIAL MEDIA
Facebook cuts tracking data
Facebook Inc on Monday barred software developers from using the massive social network’s data to create surveillance tools, closing off a process that had been exploited by US police departments to track protesters. Facebook, its Instagram unit and rival Twitter Inc came under fire last year from privacy advocates after the American Civil Liberties Union (ACLU) said in a report that police were using location data and other user information to spy on protesters in places such as Ferguson, Missouri. In response to the ACLU report, the companies shut off the data access of Geofeedia, a Chicago-based data vendor that said it works with organizations to “leverage social media,” but Facebook policy had not explicitly barred such use of data in the future.
Cairo’s new monorail slices across the city skyline, running above the familiar chaos of blaring horns and aging buses’ exhaust fumes that mark rush hour below. The US$4.5 billion monorail, opened this month, is among Egypt’s most prominent new transport projects, part of a debt-funded infrastructure drive criticized for sapping state finances while bringing limited benefits to most of the country’s 109 million people. “It feels like you’re in a different country,” said Ramy Sayed, a restaurant manager, aboard a driverless Innovia 300 train. “No noise, no traffic, we’re not used to this.” The eastern line runs 56km from the bustling middle-class
Taiwanese firms have increased investment in the Philippines in recent years as Manila’s ties with Washington deepen and global supply chains continue to shift away from China, an expert at the Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research (CIER, 中華經濟研究院) said yesterday. The Philippines had not been among Taiwanese investors’ top choices in Southeast Asia, CIER Taiwan ASEAN Studies Center director Kristy Hsu (徐遵慈) said at a seminar in Taipei. However, Taiwan’s investment in the country has grown significantly since the COVID-19 pandemic, reaching US $257 million last year, a high in recent years, she said. Although Taiwan’s total investment in the Philippines still lags
Starlux Airlines Co (星宇航空) today unveiled a long-haul network expansion plan at a shareholders’ meeting in Taipei, including direct flights to Barcelona, Spain, and Zurich, Switzerland, as well as a service connecting Taipei, Sydney and New Zealand. Starlux is to become the first Taiwanese carrier to offer non-stop services to the two European cities, while the inaugural oceanic route is expected to expand transit opportunities within the Australia-New Zealand market, Starlux said. Flight services to Chicago, Dallas, Washington and New York are under evaluation, the airline added. Prior to the shareholders’ meeting, the airline earlier this year announced that it would be
Intel Corp regards Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) as a longstanding partner, as the US chipmaker would continue outsourcing production of advanced chips to TSMC, Intel chief executive officer Lip-Bu Tan (陳立武) said yesterday. “I don’t look at people as competitors. I look at the collaboration... Nvidia is also, you know, a good friend,” Tan told a news conference following his keynote speech at the Computex trade show in Taipei. “It’s a very trusted partnership for us... We are a big, top customer for them, and we’re going to continue doing that,” he said, referring to TSMC, the world’s largest foundry
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