■ELECTRONICS
NEC, Renesas delay deal
NEC Electronics Corp and Renesas Technology Corp, Japan’s second-largest chip maker, delayed signing a merger to the end of next month, citing the need for more time to evaluate the assets. “The due diligence process is taking longer than we expected, but we are confident about reaching an agreement next month,” Shinichi Kaede, a spokesman at NEC Electronics, said by phone yesterday. The two companies, which had originally planned to agree on terms of the transaction by the end of this month, maintained their target date of April next year to complete the merger, he said. The combined company will achieve an operating-profit margin of at least 5 percent, NEC Electronics president Junshi Yamaguchi said last month.
■AVIATION
EADS profit jumps in Q2
European aerospace giant EADS yesterday reported a 76 percent jump in net profit for the second quarter to 208 million euros (US$297 million) despite costs linked to delays of its A400M plane. EADS, the parent company of Airbus, said its second-quarter operating profit was up 69 percent to 656 million euros, but for the first half of the year was down 23 percent at 888 million euros. It said the drop reflected a charge of 191 million euros taken to cover delays on the A400M military transport project. Total provisions for the aircraft add up to 2.3 billion euros.
■FINANCE
Bank to scale back network
Bank of America Corp is planning to reduce its 6,100-branch network by about 10 percent, the Wall Street Journal cited bank chief executive Kenneth Lewis as telling investors. The plans were discussed at a meeting in Charlotte, North Carolina, last Thursday, the paper said, citing people familiar with the matter. The Journal’s sources added that Liam McGee, president of Bank of America’s consumer and small-business bank, also said branch closures were planned, but did not specify how many locations could be closed.
■INTERNET
Google sells AOL stake
Time Warner has bought back Google’s 5 percent stake in struggling Internet company AOL for US$283 million. The price, paid on July 8, is close to what Google estimated its stake at earlier this year. The details emerged in a regulatory filing by AOL on Monday. The deal sets the stage for AOL’s impending spin-off from parent Time Warner. Google bought the stake for US$1 billion in 2006, but in January estimated the investment had sunk by more than 70 percent to US$274 million — giving AOL a market value of about US$5.5 billion. Time Warner agreed to buy back the stake earlier this year. The price at which New York-based Time Warner bought back the stake values AOL slightly higher, at about US$5.66 billion.
■TELECOMS
Verizon to cut 8,000 jobs
Verizon Communications, the second-largest US phone company, said on Monday it would slash another 8,000 jobs in the second half of this year amid declining earnings. Profits fell 21 percent to US$1.48 billion, or US$0.52 per share, from US$0.66 per share a year earlier, Verizon said. Revenue rose 11 percent to US$26.9 billion on increased sales of high-speed fiber-optic internet service and the company’s acquisition of rival Alltel Corp in January. Verizon was hurt by rising pension costs and cuts in landline phone service, especially by businesses.
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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