■ Indexes
Google to join S&P 500
Google Inc will be added to the Standard & Poor's 500 Index after a fourfold surge in its shares that valued the world's most-used Internet search engine at more than US$100 billion. "Based on the calendar of publicly announced deals, this was the best time to make the addition," said David Guarino, a S&P spokesman in New York. "The stock price wasn't a factor in our decision." Google is the biggest company ever added to the S&P 500, according to Nicholas Gulden, an analyst at Citigroup Inc in New York. The stock will become the highest-priced among the index's members, surpassing Goldman Sachs Group Inc.
■ Semiconductors
Siemens offloads Infineon
Siemens AG, Europe's largest engineering company, is selling its entire 18 percent stake in Infineon Technologies AG, worth about 1.2 billion euros (US$1.4 billion), in a placement managed by Goldman Sachs Group Inc. Munich-based Siemens is selling 136.3 million shares in Germany's largest maker of semiconductors, Goldman said in a statement on Thursday. The sale comes 14 months after Klaus Kleinfeld took over as Siemens' chief executive officer and completes the company's retreat from the chipmaker it spun off in an initial public offering six years ago. Kleinfeld has announced almost 7,000 job cuts, mainly at the telecommunications and computer-services divisions, and has sold the unprofitable mobile-phone unit to Taiwan's BenQ Corp (明基).
■ Banking
Brokerage to buy Tokyo Star
Japan's third-largest brokerage Nikko Cordial plans to buy a controlling stake in a Tokyo bank revived by US private equity fund Lone Star for more than US$1.2 billion, a report said yesterday. Nikko Cordial will soon launch a tender offer to buy up to 50 percent of shares in Tokyo Star Bank, the Nihon Keizai Shimbun said, adding the broker aimed to get at least one-third of the shares to become the top shareholder. Lone Star, which holds nearly 70 percent of outstanding shares in Tokyo Star, plans to sell its control over the bank, the economic daily said without naming sources. The acquisition price is likely to exceed ?140 billion (US$1.2 billion), the paper said. The deal between Nikko Cordial and Lone Star would mark the first instance in Japan of a brokerage purchasing a bank, the Nihon Keizai said.
■ Automobiles
GM to sell mortgage arm
General Motors Corp said on Thursday that its finance arm is raising nearly US$9 billion in cash by selling a majority interest in its commercial mortgage division in a move that spruces up the books of the auto loan and insurance business the struggling automaker is trying to sell. General Motors Acceptance Corp is getting US$1.5 billion in cash from an investment group for a 78 percent stake in the commercial mortgage business. In addition, that business, known as GMAC Commercial Holding Corp, repaid US$7.3 billion in intercompany loans. That boosts the total proceeds to GMAC to almost US$9 billion. The announcement comes a day after GM and its major supplier, Delphi Corp, said they plan to offer buyouts to more than 125,000 hourly workers under an agreement with the United Auto Workers. Workers are expected to start leaving GM by June 1.
CONGRESSIONAL SUPPORT: A new committee would investigate a backlog of US weapons sales to Taiwan, said its chairman, US Representative Mike Gallagher The US should formally recognize Taiwan as an independent nation, and end its outdated and counterproductive “one China” policy, US Representative Tom Tiffany and 18 other US lawmakers wrote in a petition. “It is time to change the status quo and recognize the reality denied by the US government for decades: Taiwan is an independent nation,” Tiffany told the Epoch Times. “As our long-standing and valued partner, correctly acknowledging their independence from communist China is long overdue.” The resolution also asks the administration of US President Joe Biden to support Taiwan’s membership in international organizations and to negotiate a bilateral free-trade
The Pentagon is preparing for US House of Representatives Speaker Kevin McCarthy to visit Taiwan later this year, Punchbowl News reported on Monday, citing an official directly involved in the talks. US administration officials anticipate McCarthy would visit Taiwan some time in the spring, the report said. McCarthy had previously pledged to visit Taiwan if he became House speaker. He was elected speaker earlier this month. He had also said that he would have liked to join then-US House speaker Nancy Pelosi’s delegation when she visited Taiwan in August last year. Pelosi’s 19-hour visit to Taipei marked the first time in 25 years
GUT FEELING: In the leaked memo, US Air Force General Mike Minihan urged mobile command personnel to go to a firing range, shoot at a target and ‘aim for the head’ A four-star US Air Force general has warned of a conflict with China as early as 2025 — most likely over Taiwan — and urged his commanders to push their units to achieve maximum operational battle readiness this year. In an internal memorandum that first emerged on social media on Friday, and was later confirmed as genuine by the Pentagon, Air Mobility Command Commander General Mike Minihan said that the main goal should be to deter “and, if required, defeat” China. “I hope I am wrong. My gut tells me we will fight in 2025,” Minihan said. Minihan said that Taiwan’s presidential election
Taiwan’s Chou Chieh-yu (周婕妤) was crowned the Kamui WPA Women’s World 9-Ball Champion after shutting out British pool titan Allison Fisher 9-0 in Atlantic City, New Jersey, the organizers said on Sunday. Following the championship win at Harrah’s Resort and Casino Atlantic City, Chou pocketed US$30,000 and became the first female competitor to hold both the 9-ball and 10-ball world titles since Briton Kelly Fisher in 2012. Chou, 36, won the Predator World Women’s 10-Ball Championship in Austria in September last year after clinching a silver medal at last year’s World Games in Birmingham, Alabama, in July. “I’m very excited and it’s like
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