■ COMPUTERS
Makers issue battery recall
Computer makers are recalling 100,000 laptop battery packs made by Sony Corp after 40 reports of overheating, a US Consumer Product Safety Commission notice said on Thursday. The recall applies to certain Sony 2.15Ah lithium-ion cell batteries made in Japan and sold around the world in laptops made by Hewlett-Packard Co, Dell Inc and Toshiba Corp. Twenty-one of the reports claimed minor property damage, and small burns were reported in four cases. Sony blamed two factors for the defects: adjustments on its manufacturing line from October 2004 to June 2005, which may have affected the quality of cells in certain production lots, and a possible flaw in the metal foil for electrodes.
■ BANKING
Barclays seeking capital
Barclays PLC said yesterday it was seeking up to £7.3 billion (US$11.8 billion) from Middle Eastern investors to avoid resorting to a British government bailout. The money would come from investment funds and royal families in Qatar and Abu Dhabi. Yesterday’s announcement follows an earlier £4.5 billion cash call by the bank in June. Barclays said the investment would enable it to meet new rules on banks’ capitalization ordered by Britain’s financial regulators. “The board believes that this maintains Barclays as a strong, independent and well capitalized bank,” chairman Marcus Agius said.
■ BANKING
Mizuho halves profit target
Japan’s second-largest bank, Mizuho Financial Group, said yesterday it had slashed its net profit target for this year by more than half in the face of global financial turmoil. Mizuho forecast a 19.7 percent drop in net profit to ¥250 billion (US$2.5 billion) in the fiscal year to March, well short of a previous forecast of ¥560 billion. It blamed the falling stock market, rising corporate bankruptcies and the collapse of Wall Street bank Lehman Brothers. The bank said it made a net profit of about ¥94 billion in the six months to September, down sharply from ¥327.06 billion a year earlier, missing its target of ¥250 billion. Mizuho, one of Japan’s three megabanks, saw its profits roughly halved last year amid heavy losses from the subprime loan crisis in the US.
■ ICELAND
PM warns of huge deficit
Prime Minister Geir Haarde said on Thursday the total cost of the nation’s banking crisis could amount to 1.1 trillion Icelandic crowns (US$9.4 billion), or 85 percent of last year’s GDP. According to a statement released by the prime minister’s office, Haarde told parliament the budget deficit next year could be as high as 10 percent of economic output, pushing gross debt — which stood at 29 percent of GDP at the end of last year — above 100 percent by the end of next year. Its GDP last year was around US$11 billion.
■ AUTOMOBILES
Toyota to reopen US plants
Toyota Motor Corp said yesterday it would reopen three US factories after a three-month suspension in the face of falling US demand, using them to produce exports for the Middle East and Latin America. The factories in Texas, Indiana and Alabama will resume producing Sequoia sports utility vehicles and Tundra pick-up trucks by the middle of this month, Japan’s largest automaker said. Toyota’s sales are expected to fall this year for the first time in a decade amid the global slowdown. Toyota’s sales in the US plunged 29.5 percent in September.
The CIA has a message for Chinese government officials worried about their place in Chinese President Xi Jinping’s (習近平) government: Come work with us. The agency released two Mandarin-language videos on social media on Thursday inviting disgruntled officials to contact the CIA. The recruitment videos posted on YouTube and X racked up more than 5 million views combined in their first day. The outreach comes as CIA Director John Ratcliffe has vowed to boost the agency’s use of intelligence from human sources and its focus on China, which has recently targeted US officials with its own espionage operations. The videos are “aimed at
STEADFAST FRIEND: The bills encourage increased Taiwan-US engagement and address China’s distortion of UN Resolution 2758 to isolate Taiwan internationally The Presidential Office yesterday thanked the US House of Representatives for unanimously passing two Taiwan-related bills highlighting its solid support for Taiwan’s democracy and global participation, and for deepening bilateral relations. One of the bills, the Taiwan Assurance Implementation Act, requires the US Department of State to periodically review its guidelines for engagement with Taiwan, and report to the US Congress on the guidelines and plans to lift self-imposed limitations on US-Taiwan engagement. The other bill is the Taiwan International Solidarity Act, which clarifies that UN Resolution 2758 does not address the issue of the representation of Taiwan or its people in
US Indo-Pacific Commander Admiral Samuel Paparo on Friday expressed concern over the rate at which China is diversifying its military exercises, the Financial Times (FT) reported on Saturday. “The rates of change on the depth and breadth of their exercises is the one non-linear effect that I’ve seen in the last year that wakes me up at night or keeps me up at night,” Paparo was quoted by FT as saying while attending the annual Sedona Forum at the McCain Institute in Arizona. Paparo also expressed concern over the speed with which China was expanding its military. While the US
SHIFT: Taiwan’s better-than-expected first-quarter GDP and signs of weakness in the US have driven global capital back to emerging markets, the central bank head said The central bank yesterday blamed market speculation for the steep rise in the local currency, and urged exporters and financial institutions to stay calm and stop panic sell-offs to avoid hurting their own profitability. The nation’s top monetary policymaker said that it would step in, if necessary, to maintain order and stability in the foreign exchange market. The remarks came as the NT dollar yesterday closed up NT$0.919 to NT$30.145 against the US dollar in Taipei trading, after rising as high as NT$29.59 in intraday trading. The local currency has surged 5.85 percent against the greenback over the past two sessions, central
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