■ FINANCE
HSBC stops US sales
HSBC Holdings PLC said it stopped selling and trading mortgage-backed securities in the US as the British bank adapts its businesses to turmoil caused by mortgage defaults and a loss of investor confidence. About 120 jobs will be cut across its investment-banking operations globally, including some 100 in the US, an HSBC spokesman who asked not to be named said on Thursday. The move comes amid investors' resistance to buying many mortgage securities.
■ TECHNOLOGY
Blu-ray in `stalemate'
Sony Corp head Howard Stringer said the Blu-ray disc format the company has developed as the successor to the DVD is in a "stalemate" with the competing HD DVD format, chiefly backed by Toshiba Corp and Microsoft Corp. "It's a difficult fight," said Stringer, speaking on Thursday at the 92nd Street Y cultural center in Manhattan. Toshiba sells its players for as low as US$200, while Blu-ray players cost more than twice as much. In August, the HD DVD camp induced Paramount Pictures to drop most of its support for Blu-ray. "We were trying to win on the merits, which we were doing for a while, until Paramount changed sides," Stringer said.
■ FINANCE
Chinese bank opens in US
The US Federal Reserve has announced its approval of an application by China Merchants Bank Co (中國招商銀行) to open a branch in New York. China's sixth-largest lender by assets, Shenzhen-based China Merchants Bank, is indirectly controlled by the Chinese government through wholly owned companies. The Fed said the bank branch "would engage in wholesale deposit-taking, lending, trade finance and other banking services." Chinese banks recently have made a push to open branches in the US, with an application still pending by leading lender Industrial & Commercial Bank of China Ltd (中國工商銀行).
■ OIL
Brazil finds huge reserve
A huge offshore oil discovery could raise Brazil's petroleum reserves by a massive 40 percent and boost the country into the ranks of the world's major exporters, officials said. The government-run oil company Petroleo Brasileiro SA, or Petrobras, said the new "ultra-deep" Tupi field could hold as much as 8 billion barrels of recoverable light crude, sending Petrobras shares soaring and prompting predictions that Brazil could join the world's "top 10" oil producers. Petrobras president Sergio Gabrielli said on Thursday the oil from ultra-deep areas would give Brazil the world's eighth-largest oil and gas reserves.
■ WTO
China threatens veto
China has threatened to veto any proposals on cutting customs tariffs on industrial goods at the WTO if its requests are not met, sources said yesterday. During a meeting of the negotiating group on non-agricultural market access, China's delegate said he had received instructions from Beijing to veto any revised text put forward by group chair Don Stephenson if it "failed to meet China's minimum requirements," the sources said. The move was seen as a bid to put pressure on the negotiations in the Doha Round of trade liberalization talks. But sources said it would be very difficult for China to veto the whole Doha package as Beijing stands to make substantial gains from a successful WTO deal.
AIR DEFENSE: The Norwegian missile system has proved highly effective in Ukraine in its war against Russia, and the US has recommended it for Taiwan, an expert said The Norwegian Advanced Surface-to-Air Missile Systems (NASAMS) Taiwan ordered from the US would be installed in strategically important positions in Taipei and New Taipei City to guard the region, the Ministry of National Defense said in statement yesterday. The air defense system would be deployed in Taipei’s Songshan District (松山) and New Taipei City’s Tamsui District (淡水), the ministry said, adding that the systems could be delivered as soon as the end of this year. The US Defense Security Cooperation Agency has previously said that three NASAMS would be sold to Taiwan. The weapons are part of the 17th US arms sale to
SERIOUS ALLEGATIONS: The suspects formed spy networks and paramilitary groups to kill government officials during a possible Chinese invasion, prosecutors said Prosecutors have indicted seven retired military officers, members of the Rehabilitation Alliance Party, for allegedly obtaining funds from China, and forming paramilitary groups and assassination squads in Taiwan to collaborate with Chinese troops in a possible war. The suspects contravened the National Security Act (國家安全法) by taking photos and drawing maps of key radar stations, missile installations and the American Institute in Taiwan’s headquarters in Taipei, prosecutors said. They allegedly prepared to collaborate with China during a possible invasion of Taiwan, prosecutors said. Retired military officer Chu Hung-i (屈宏義), 62, a Republic of China Army Academy graduate, went to China
INSURRECTION: The NSB said it found evidence the CCP was seeking snipers in Taiwan to target members of the military and foreign organizations in the event of an invasion The number of Chinese spies prosecuted in Taiwan has grown threefold over a four-year period, the National Security Bureau (NSB) said in a report released yesterday. In 2021 and 2022, 16 and 10 spies were prosecuted respectively, but that number grew to 64 last year, it said, adding that the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) was working with gangs in Taiwan to develop a network of armed spies. Spies in Taiwan have on behalf of the CCP used a variety of channels and methods to infiltrate all sectors of the country, and recruited Taiwanese to cooperate in developing organizations and obtaining sensitive information
BREAKTHROUGH: The US is making chips on par in yield and quality with Taiwan, despite people saying that it could not happen, the official said Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) has begun producing advanced 4-nanometer (nm) chips for US customers in Arizona, US Secretary of Commerce Gina Raimondo said, a milestone in the semiconductor efforts of the administration of US President Joe Biden. In November last year, the commerce department finalized a US$6.6 billion grant to TSMC’s US unit for semiconductor production in Phoenix, Arizona. “For the first time ever in our country’s history, we are making leading edge 4-nanometer chips on American soil, American workers — on par in yield and quality with Taiwan,” Raimondo said, adding that production had begun in recent
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