■ Tourism
Nomura wins resort bid
Nomura Holdings Inc's investment unit has won a bid to help rescue failed Huis Ten Bosch Co, the operator of a 17th century Dutch-style theme park in southwestern Japan, the Nihon Keizai Shimbun reported. Nomura Principal Finance Co beat Ripplewood Holdings LLC with an offer of about ¥30 billion (US$257 million), the paper said, without saying where it obtained the information. Nomura Principal will sign a contract with Huis Ten Bosch's business administrator as early as tomorrow. Nomura Principal plans to cut costs by reducing salaries of employees at the resort located in Sasebo, Nagasaki Prefecture, and to achieve profit by targeting about 1.5 million visitors, the paper said. Huis Ten Bosch had about 2.79 million visitors in the year ended March 31. There is no plan to cut jobs.
■ Privatization
China to tweak sale rules
China will create a framework with which to regulate sales of state assets to improve transparency, the South China Morning Post said, citing government officials. Officials at the State Assets Management Commission, which was set up to oversee state enterprises, were alarmed by some local governments which sold off state assets below market value, the newspaper said. Research was being done to determine rules for the national market, Zhang Delin, head of the commission's regulation bureau, was quoted as saying. Zhang didn't comment on the nature of the rules and when they will be implemented.
■ Counterfeiting
China copies hotel
The talents of Chinese counterfeiters are renowned but even their latest effort has stunned their Hong Kong neighbors -- an exact replica of the venerated Peninsula hotel. Owned by the Chinese state power firm behind the Three Gorges Dam project, the four-star Peninsular hotel in Hubei Province, bears a striking resemblance to the real Peninsula hotel, with the same beige coloring, British colonial-style elegance and circular crest. The only notable difference from the outside between the 154-room fake luxury hotel and the original is the name -- "Peninsular Hotel," instead of "The Peninsula," the Sunday Morning Post reported. Hong Kong-based Peninsula Group has threatened legal action to put a stop to what the group's company lawyer Christobelle Liao described as "a blatant infringement" of the hotel chain's trademark rights.
■ Shipping
Firm buys port stake
Singapore's Ports and Services Authority has agreed to sell a stake in one of its terminals to a Chinese shipping company, a newspaper reported yesterday. The deal between the Ports and Services Authority, or PSA, and Cosco Pacific was signed in Hainan island on Saturday, The Straits Times reported. Under the agreement, Cosco would control two berths -- which can handle up to 2 million containers a year -- at PSA's Pasir Panjang terminal by 2008. Cosco would then take a 49-percent stake in Pasir Panjang. Cosco Pacific is the investment arm of China's largest shipping operator -- China Ocean Shipping Group Co. Singapore's status as Southeast Asia's premier port operator has been coming under threat since Malaysia opened its Tanjung Pelepas facility in 2000. Two of Singapore's biggest customers -- Danish company Maersk Sealand and Taiwan's Evergreen (長榮) now use Tanjung Pelepas.
‘SECRETS’: While saying China would not attack during his presidency, Donald Trump declined to say how Washington would respond if Beijing were to take military action US President Donald Trump said that China would not take military action against Taiwan while he is president, as the Chinese leaders “know the consequences.” Trump made the statement during an interview on CBS’ 60 Minutes program that aired on Sunday, a few days after his meeting with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) in South Korea. “He [Xi] has openly said, and his people have openly said at meetings, ‘we would never do anything while President Trump is president,’ because they know the consequences,” Trump said in the interview. However, he repeatedly declined to say exactly how Washington would respond in
Japanese Prime Minister Sanae Takaichi said yesterday that China using armed force against Taiwan could constitute a "survival-threatening situation" for Japan, allowing the country to mobilize the Japanese armed forces under its security laws. Takaichi made the remarks during a parliamentary session yesterday while responding to a question about whether a "Taiwan contingency" involving a Chinese naval blockade would qualify as a "survival-threatening situation" for Japan, according to a report by Japan’s Asahi Shimbun. "If warships are used and other armed actions are involved, I believe this could constitute a survival- threatening
Taiwan’s exports soared to an all-time high of US$61.8 billion last month, surging 49.7 percent from a year earlier, as the global frenzy for artificial intelligence (AI) applications and new consumer electronics powered shipments of high-tech goods, the Ministry of Finance said yesterday. It was the first time exports had exceeded the US$60 billion mark, fueled by the global boom in AI development that has significantly boosted Taiwanese companies across the international supply chain, Department of Statistics Director-General Beatrice Tsai (蔡美娜) told a media briefing. “There is a consensus among major AI players that the upcycle is still in its early stage,”
WARFARE: All sectors of society should recognize, unite, and collectively resist and condemn Beijing’s cross-border suppression, MAC Minister Chiu Chui-cheng said The number of Taiwanese detained because of legal affairs by Chinese authorities has tripled this year, as Beijing intensified its intimidation and division of Taiwanese by combining lawfare and cognitive warfare, the Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) said yesterday. MAC Minister Chiu Chui-cheng (邱垂正) made the statement in response to questions by Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) Legislator Puma Shen (沈柏洋) about the government’s response to counter Chinese public opinion warfare, lawfare and psychological warfare. Shen said he is also being investigated by China for promoting “Taiwanese independence.” He was referring to a report published on Tuesday last week by China’s state-run Xinhua news agency,
RSS