■ Banking
CSFB fires 20% of bankers
Credit Suisse First Boston fired about 400 investment bankers while Bear Stearns Co fired as many as 50 equity salespeople and traders, according to people familiar with the situation. Credit Suisse's cuts come after Chief Executive John Mack warned earlier this month he would eliminate as many as 1,750 jobs, or cut 7 percent of its work force of 25,000. Bear Stearns, the No.6 US firm by capital and the only firm to report quarterly-earnings gains every quarter this year, hasn't cut as deeply as rivals because it hadn't grown as much during the telecom-munications and underwriting boom in the 1990s. "Every firm on Wall Street is cutting into muscle, not fat, at this point," said Jeff Bell, co-head of the investment banking practice at Spencer Stuart, a recruiting firm in New York.
■ Telecoms
DoCoMo retreats to Japan
Japan's NTT DoCoMo Inc plans to halt investment in its overseas counterparts until the global telecommunica-tions market recovers, following the company's huge losses incurred from its strategy of actively seeking capital alliance abroad, a leading Japanese newspaper reported yesterday. According to the Asahi Shimbun, the largest Japanese mobile phone company will instead focus on promoting tie-ups to offer its leading "i-mode" technology for Internet-capable mobile phones to overseas concerns.
■ Consumer trends
Confidence down in the US
US consumer confidence plunged in October, pushed downward by a weak labor market and the looming threat of military action in Iraq, according to a closely watched index released Tuesday by the Conference Board. The private research group's consumer confidence index declined 14.3 points to 79.4 in October, from a revised 93.7 in September. This is the lowest level of consumer confidence since November 1993. Confidence has fallen for five straight months. Consumer confidence is considered critical to the economic outlook because consumer spending accounts for two-thirds of US economic activity.
■ Robotics
Robot can `hear' feelings
Japan's Business Design Laboratory said yesterday it developed a robot which can read people's feelings through their tone of voice and responds accordingly. Kenji Kimura, head of the laboratory in Japan's central Nagoya city in Aichi prefecture, said the robot could tell by people's tone of voice whether they are happy, sad, upset or are having fun. If the owner raises his voice, the robot promptly responds: "I'm sorry. Don't get upset." The robot, called IF, is 40cm tall and weighs 5kg. IF will be on the Japanese market coming April at a price of ?300,000 (US$2,440).
■ Consumer trends
P&G posts good results
US consumer products giant Procter & Gamble Co Tuesday posted impressive third quarter results as profits surged by a third on stronger sales in several product lines. Procter & Gamble said net income in the quarter amounted to US$1.46 billion, or US$1.10 per share, compared to US$1.1 billion for the same period a year ago. Profits grew to US$1.58 billion in the quarter. Sales rose more than 11 percent to US$10.8 billion as the company's varied products such as the new Crest Spinbrush and osteoporosis drug Actonel had strong sales growth.
Agencies
Taiwan has arranged for about 8 million barrels of crude oil, or about one-third of its monthly needs, to be shipped from the Red Sea this month to bypass the Strait of Hormuz and ease domestic supply pressures, CPC Corp, Taiwan (CPC, 台灣中油) said yesterday. The state-run oil company has worked with Middle Eastern suppliers to secure routes other than the Strait of Hormuz, through which about 20 percent of the world’s oil and liquefied natural gas typically passes, CPC chairman Fang Jeng-zen (方振仁) said at a meeting of the legislature’s Economics Committee in Taipei. Suppliers in Saudi Arabia have indicated they
A global survey showed that 60 percent of Taiwanese had attained higher education, second only to Canada, the Ministry of the Interior said. Taiwan easily surpassed the global average of 43 percent and ranked ahead of major economies, including Japan, South Korea and the US, data from the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) for 2024 showed. Taiwan has a high literacy rate, data released by the ministry showed. As of the end of last year, Taiwan had 20.617 million people aged 15 or older, accounting for 88.5 percent of the total population, with a literacy rate of 99.4 percent, the data
CCP ‘PAWN’? Beijing could use the KMT chairwoman’s visit to signal to the world that many people in Taiwan support the ‘one China’ principle, an academic said Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) yesterday arrived in China for a “peace” mission and potential meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平), while a Taiwanese minister detailed the number of Chinese warships currently deployed around the nation. Cheng is visiting at a time of increased Chinese military pressure on Taiwan, as the opposition-dominated Legislative Yuan stalls a government plan for US$40 billion in extra defense spending. Speaking to reporters before going to the airport, Cheng said she was going on a “historic journey for peace,” but added that some people felt uneasy about her trip. “If you truly love Taiwan,
South Korea has adjusted its electronic arrival card system to no longer list Taiwan as a part of China, a move that the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said would help facilitate exchanges between the two sides. South Korea previously listed “Taiwan” as “Taiwan (China)” in the drop-down menus of its online arrival card system, where people had to fill out where they came from and their next destination. The ministry had requested South Korea make a revision and said it would change South Korea’s name on Taiwan’s online immigration system from “Republic of Korea” to “Korea (South),” should the issue not be
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