■PHARMACEUTICALS
Novartis profits down 10%
Drug maker Novartis AG yesterday reported a 10 percent drop in second-quarter net profit owing to currency fluctuations and higher financing costs, but said underlying growth was helped markedly by advances in its pharmaceuticals division. Its after-tax profit in the second quarter dropped to US$2 billion from US$2.3 billion during the same period last year. Profit for the first six months was US$4 billion, down 12 percent from the year-earlier figure because of the currency fluctuations and the costs of financing the takeover of Alcon, the eye care company, Novartis said.
■TELECOMS
BT to recall jobs
British telecoms operator BT is to recall to the UK at least 2,000 call-center jobs based in India, the Times reported yesterday. The newspaper said BT chief executive Ian Livingston had revealed the plan on Wednesday in response to a question asked by a shareholder at the group’s annual general meeting. In recent years, big British companies have outsourced thousands of call-center jobs to India to cut costs but have faced criticism from Britain-based customers unhappy at the level of service received. BT’s move to repatriate some of its jobs was not “about customer service,” said a group spokesman, quoted by the Times. “It is about the effective deployment of our resources,” he said.
■MINING
Rio Tinto pulls analysts
Mining giant Rio Tinto Ltd has pulled researchers who follow China’s steel industry out of the country after four employees were detained on spying allegations during iron ore price talks, news reports said yesterday. The employees left on Wednesday, the Australian Financial Review and China’s 21st Century Business Herald said. The Herald said they went to Singapore or Australia. Neither said how many people were involved or gave other details. A Rio spokeswoman in Melbourne, Amanda Buckley, declined to comment. The Herald, citing an unidentified member of China’s negotiating team, said the Chinese had switched to talking with Brazil’s Vale about prices because “there is no one at Rio that we can talk to.”
■AVIATION
Lufthansa plans cost cuts
Lufthansa, the leading German airline, announced plans to cut costs to save 1 billion euros (US$1.4 billion) per year from 2011, a spokeswoman said yesterday. “We confirm” a report earlier in the day by the business daily Handelsblatt, which said the plan, dubbed “Climb 2011,” would focus on passenger transport activities, spokeswoman Claudia Lange said. “Our passenger costs must fall,” and details will be released in the coming weeks, she said. A letter sent by Lufthansa chief executive Christoph Franz to the airline’s staff warned that “air traffic is mired in the worst crisis in its history.”
■BANKING
MUFG to raise US$3.9bn
Japan’s biggest lender, Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group (MUFG), said yesterday that it would tap investors for ¥370 billion (US$3.9 billion) in capital to strengthen its financial base. The group plans to issue preferred stock on July 29 that cannot be converted into common shares, a statement said. Including the latest sale, MUFG will have raised about ¥1.46 trillion in new capital since the global financial crisis erupted last year. Late last year the group issued ¥990 billion in shares. In March this year it sold ¥97.4 billion in preferred securities.
MILESTONE: The foreign minister called the signing ‘a major step forward in US-Taiwan relations,’ while the Presidential Office said it was a symbol of the nations’ shared values US President Donald Trump on Tuesday signed into law the Taiwan Assurance Implementation Act, which requires the US Department of State to regularly review and update guidelines governing official US interactions with Taiwan. The new law is an amendment to the Taiwan Assurance Act of 2020 focused on reviewing guidelines on US interactions with Taiwan. Previously, the state department was required to conduct a one-time review of its guidance governing relations with Taiwan, but under the new bill, the agency must conduct a review “not less than every five years.” It must then submit an updated report based on its findings “not later
The Presidential Office today thanked the US for enacting the Taiwan Assurance Implementation Act, which requires the US Department of State to regularly review and update guidelines governing official US interactions with Taiwan. The new law, signed by US President Donald Trump yesterday, is an amendment to the Taiwan Assurance Act of 2020 focused on reviewing guidelines on US interactions with Taiwan. Previously, the department was required to conduct a one-time review of its guidance governing relations with Taiwan, but under the new bill, the agency must conduct such a review "not less than every five years." It must then submit an updated
CROSS-STRAIT COLLABORATION: The new KMT chairwoman expressed interest in meeting the Chinese president from the start, but she’ll have to pay to get in Beijing allegedly agreed to let Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) Chairwoman Cheng Li-wun (鄭麗文) meet with Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) around the Lunar New Year holiday next year on three conditions, including that the KMT block Taiwan’s arms purchases, a source said yesterday. Cheng has expressed interest in meeting Xi since she won the KMT’s chairmanship election in October. A source, speaking on condition of anonymity, said a consensus on a meeting was allegedly reached after two KMT vice chairmen visited China’s Taiwan Affairs Office Director Song Tao (宋濤) in China last month. Beijing allegedly gave the KMT three conditions it had to
STAYING ALERT: China this week deployed its largest maritime show of force to date in the region, prompting concern in Taipei and Tokyo, which Beijing has brushed off Deterring conflict over Taiwan is a priority, the White House said in its National Security Strategy published yesterday, which also called on Japan and South Korea to increase their defense spending to help protect the first island chain. Taiwan is strategically positioned between Northeast and Southeast Asia, and provides direct access to the second island chain, with one-third of global shipping passing through the South China Sea, the report said. Given the implications for the US economy, along with Taiwan’s dominance in semiconductors, “deterring a conflict over Taiwan, ideally by preserving military overmatch, is a priority,” it said. However, the strategy also reiterated
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