■STEEL
ArcelorMittal may cut jobs
ArcelorMittal, the world’s biggest steelmaker, could cut 10,000 jobs worldwide next year to boost productivity and reduce general expenses by around US$500 million, French newspaper Les Echos said yesterday. The company, which employs 285,300 people, wants to regain lost market share and has a goal for general expenses to account for less than 3.5 percent of revenue, the paper said, citing trade union representatives who attended a European workers committee meeting last week.
■FINANCE
Lloyds cash call does well
Lloyds Banking Group said yesterday the take-up for its record £13.5 billion (US$21.9 billion) rights issue totaled more than 95 percent, drawing a line under a turbulent few months for Britain’s largest retail lender. Lloyd’s cash call — the world’s largest to date — is a key plank of its bumper capital raising effort launched last month to enable the bailed-out bank to avoid a state-backed insurance scheme for bad debts. A high take-up is the strongest indication yet of shareholder support for its turnaround efforts. After the 95 percent take-up, just over £600 million in shares will be left to be placed by its underwriters, Bank of America Merill Lynch, UBS and Citigroup — considerably better than Lloyds’ last rights offer in June, which left 13.1 percent to be placed by its bankers.
■FOOD
Cadbury rejects Kraft offer
British confectionary group Cadbury yesterday rejected a takeover bid from US giant Kraft Foods, describing the offer as insufficient. Cadbury management said it was offering shareholders maximum value by keeping the company independent, notably as it was raising its long-term financial targets. “Kraft is trying to buy Cadbury on the cheap to provide much needed growth to their unattractive low-growth conglomerate business model,” Cadbury chairman Roger Carr said in a circular to shareholders. “Don’t let Kraft steal your company with its derisory offer.” Cadbury said it now foresaw organic growth of 5 percent to 7 percent a year, a profit margin of 16 percent to 18 percent by 2013 and double-digit growth in dividends per share starting next year. Kraft, which has been repeatedly snubbed by Cadbury management, had appealed directly to Cadbury shareholders with details of its offer.
■INTERNET
AOL may sell ICQ
AOL is in talks to sell ICQ, an instant-messaging service, to Digital Sky Technologies of Russia, a person briefed on the matter said on Sunday. The discussions, which are still in the early stages and may not result in a deal. The talks come in the wake of AOL’s new independence after spinning off from Time Warner last week. AOL’s chief executive, Tim Armstrong, said recently that the company would seek to sell noncore assets as it reshaped itself into an online media company. AOL may fetch at least US$200 million for ICQ, an early instant-messaging client that initially competed against AOL’s own offering. Other AOL holdings, like the Bebo social network, may also be put up for sale. While not big presences within the US, both ICQ and Bebo have big user bases abroad. Digital Sky Technologies, a Russian investment firm, paid US$200 million for a 3.5 percent stake in Facebook this summer. AOL acquired ICQ’s parent, Mirabilis, from its four founders in 1998 for US$287 million in upfront cash and US$120 million in payments tied to performance milestones.
Taiwan’s Lee Chia-hao (李佳豪) on Sunday won a silver medal at the All England Open Badminton Championships in Birmingham, England, a career best. Lee, 25, took silver in the final of the men’s singles against world No. 1 Shi Yuqi (石宇奇) of China, who won 21-17, 21-19 in a tough match that lasted 51 minutes. After the match, the Taiwanese player, who ranks No. 22 in the world, said it felt unreal to be challenging an opponent of Shi’s caliber. “I had to be in peak form, and constantly switch my rhythm and tactics in order to score points effectively,” he said. Lee got
EMBRACING TAIWAN: US lawmakers have introduced an act aiming to replace the use of ‘Chinese Taipei’ with ‘Taiwan’ across all Washington’s federal agencies A group of US House of Representatives lawmakers has introduced legislation to replace the term “Chinese Taipei” with “Taiwan” across all federal agencies. US Representative Byron Donalds announced the introduction of the “America supports Taiwan act,” which would mandate federal agencies adopt “Taiwan” in place of “Chinese Taipei,” a news release on his page on the US House of Representatives’ Web site said. US representatives Mike Collins, Barry Moore and Tom Tiffany are cosponsors of the legislation, US political newspaper The Hill reported yesterday. “The legislation is a push to normalize the position of Taiwan as an autonomous country, although the official US
CHANGE OF TONE: G7 foreign ministers dropped past reassurances that there is no change in the position of the G7 members on Taiwan, including ‘one China’ policies G7 foreign ministers on Friday took a tough stance on China, stepping up their language on Taiwan and omitting some conciliatory references from past statements, including to “one China” policies. A statement by ministers meeting in Canada mirrored last month’s Japan-US statement in condemning “coercion” toward Taiwan. Compared with a G7 foreign ministers’ statement in November last year, the statement added members’ concerns over China’s nuclear buildup, although it omitted references to their concerns about Beijing’s human rights abuses in Xinjiang, Tibet and Hong Kong. Also missing were references stressing the desire for “constructive and stable relations with China” and
‘CROWN JEWEL’: Washington ‘can delay and deter’ Chinese President Xi Jinping’s plans for Taiwan, but it is ‘a very delicate situation there,’ the secretary of state said US President Donald Trump is opposed to any change to Taiwan’s “status quo” by force or extortion and would maintain that policy, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio told the Hugh Hewitt Show host on Wednesday. The US’ policy is to maintain Taiwan’s “status quo” and to oppose any changes in the situation by force or extortion, Rubio said. Hewitt asked Rubio about the significance of Trump earlier this month speaking with Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (台積電) chairman C.C. Wei (魏哲家) at the White House, a meeting that Hewitt described as a “big deal.” Asked whether the meeting was an indication of the
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