■ ELECTRONICS
Sharp profits up
Japan's Sharp Corp reported a modest increase in third-quarter profits yesterday, helped by rising sales of liquid-crystal-display televisions and mobile telephones. But the company suffered a drop in profits for the first three quarters of the fiscal year as it invested in overseas production hubs and felt the effects of tax law changes. Sharp said its net profit rose 3.8 percent to £29.60 billion (US$278 million) in the three months to December from a year earlier. The company maintained its forecast for net profit to rise 3.2 percent to £105 billion for the full year.
■ SEMICONDUCTORS
Hynix profits plunge
Hynix Semiconductor Inc said yesterday that net profit last year plunged from the year before as prices of DRAM chips and NAND flash memory chips declined. Hynix, the world's second-largest computer memory chip manufacturer, said in a regulatory filing that it recorded a net profit of 328.59 billion won (US$348.7 million) compared with 2.01 trillion won a year earlier. Sales last year rose 11 percent to 8.43 trillion won from 7.569 trillion. For the final three months of last year, the company reported a loss of 467 billion won compared with a profit of 1.02 trillion won the year before.
■ BANKING
Paribas mulls SocGen bid
French bank BNP Paribas revealed on Thursday it was weighing a bid for stricken national rival Societe Generale. A week after announcing losses of 4.8 billion euros (US$7.1 billion) blamed on a rogue trader, Societe Generale is fighting to discourage potential takeover bids and raise 5.5 billion euros in fresh capital. A spokeswoman for BNP Paribas, France's top bank, said on Thursday it was considering making a bid: "We are thinking [about it], simply because all of Europe is thinking about it," she said. Foreign banks including Britain's HSBC and Barclays, Germany's Deutsche Bank, Spain's Banco Santander and Italy's UniCredit have also been cited as potential suitors.
■ WIRELESS
LM Ericsson to lay off 1,000
Wireless equipment maker LM Ericsson AB reported a sharp drop in fourth-quarter net profits and said yesterday it would lay off around 1,000 employees in Sweden because of cost cuts. In its earnings release, the Stockholm-based company said it planned to save around 4 billion kronor (US$629 million) a year, with all parts of its business to be affected. The company said operating margin for the quarter fell to 14 percent, from a previous 22.5 percent in the same three months in 2006. Fourth-quarter net profit fell 42 percent year-on-year to 5.6 billion kronor.
■ OIL
Supplies to be held steady OPEC
oil producers yesterday prepared to keep oil supplies unchanged despite worries among some leading Gulf producers that US$90-a-barrel crude is too high for consumer countries concerned about recession. Several ministers from OPEC have said they expect no change in policy at a meeting to be held yesterday. Powerful Saudi Oil Minister Ali al-Nimi will back no change, al-Hayat newspaper reported, saying global supply and demand were in balance. Speaking early yesterday, OPEC president Chakib Khelil said he expected production to remain unchanged.
RISK REMAINS: An official said that with the US presidential elections so close, it is unclear if China would hold war games or keep its reaction to angry words The Ministry of National Defense said it was “on alert” as it detected a Chinese aircraft carrier group to Taiwan’s south yesterday amid concerns in Taiwan about the possibility of a new round of Chinese war games. The ministry said in a statement that a Chinese navy group led by the carrier Liaoning had entered waters near the Bashi Channel, which connects the South China Sea and the Pacific Ocean and separates Taiwan from the Philippines. It said the carrier group was expected to enter the Western Pacific. The military is keeping a close watch on developments and “exercising an
FIVE-YEAR WINDOW? A defense institute CEO said a timeline for a potential Chinese invasion was based on expected ‘tough measures’ when Xi Jinping seeks a new term Most Taiwanese are willing to defend the nation against a Chinese attack, but the majority believe Beijing is unlikely to invade within the next five years, a poll showed yesterday. The poll carried out last month was commissioned by the Institute for National Defense and Security Research, a Taipei-based think tank, and released ahead of Double Ten National Day today, when President William Lai (賴清德) is to deliver a speech. China maintains a near-daily military presence around Taiwan and has held three rounds of war games in the past two years. CIA Director William Burns last year said that Chinese President Xi Jinping
RESILIENCE: Once the system is operational, there would be no need to worry about the risks posed by disasters or other emergencies on communication systems, an official said Taiwan would have 24-hour access to low Earth orbit satellites by the end of this month through service provided by Eutelsat OneWeb as part of the nation’s effort to enhance signal resilience, a Chunghwa Telecom Co (中華電信) official said yesterday. Earlier this year the Ministry of Digital Affairs, which partnered with Chunghwa Telecom on a two-year project to boost signal resilience throughout the nation, said it reached a milestone when it made contact with OneWeb’s satellites half of the time. It expects to have the capability to maintain constant contact with the satellites and have nationwide coverage by the end
REACTION TO LAI: A former US official said William Lai took a step toward stability with his National Day speech and the question was how Beijing would respond US Secretary of State Antony Blinken yesterday warned China against taking any “provocative” action on Taiwan after Beijing’s reaction to President William Lai’s (賴清德) speech on Double Ten National Day on Thursday. Blinken, speaking in Laos after an ASEAN East Asia Summit, called the speech by Lai, in which he vowed to “resist annexation,” a “regular exercise.” “China should not use it in any fashion as a pretext for provocative actions,” Blinken told reporters. “On the contrary, we want to reinforce — and many other countries want to reinforce — the imperative of preserving the status quo, and neither party taking any
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