■ INVESTMENT
E.Sun to buy back bonds
E.Sun Financial Holding Co (玉山金控) said it would buy back US$267 million of bonds convertible into shares. E.Sun will purchase the bonds, issued in 2006, after an investor exercised the right to sell the securities, the Taipei-based company said in a filing to the stock exchange. The investor held a put option, which gives the holder of a security the right to sell under certain conditions. The terms of the bond and the identity of the seller were not provided in the statement. Temasek Holdings Pte, the Singapore government's investment company, bought the bonds in March 2006, the two companies said in a statement at that time.
■ INTERNET
'Spam king' admits guilt
A man once described as one of the world's top e-mail spammers pleaded guilty in Seattle, Washington, on Friday to federal charges of mail fraud, wire fraud, and failure to file a tax return. Robert Alan Soloway, 29, was dubbed "the spam king" by prosecutors who said he used networks of compromised computers to send out millions upon millions of junk e-mails since 2003. He was arrested last summer and charged in a 40-count indictment. He agreed to plead guilty to the three charges and the rest were dropped, including e-mail fraud, aggravated identity theft and numerous other counts of mail and wire fraud. He could face up to 20 years in prison.
■ FOOD
Venezuela buys meat chain
The Venezuelan government has bought a private chain of meatpacking plants and has its sights set on a major dairy company, President Hugo Chavez said on Friday, as the country seeks to stem sporadic shortages of food staples. Chavez said the government purchased the meat plants as part of its efforts to improve food distribution while moving toward a socialist state. He did not identify the company or give details, but said it represents a majority of the country's meatpacking and cold-storage transport facilities. "We've nationalized a great chain," Chavez said, adding that the government bought it outright without "trampling" the seller's rights.
■ ELECTRONICS
US game sales jump 34%
US sales of video game hardware and software last month jumped 34 percent to US$1.33 billion, as Sony's PlayStation 3 outsold Microsoft's Xbox 360 for the second month running. Both consoles still trailed far behind Nintendo's Wii, which sold 432,000 units, compared to the PS3's 281,000 and Xbox 360's 255,000 units, market research firm NPD said. Overall the top selling console was Nintendo's handheld DS, which sold 588,000 units. Software sales last month were up 47 percent year-on-year, while hardware sales rose 19 percent, NPD said.
■ BANKING
Dresdner to split activities
Dresdner Bank, part of the giant Allianz insurance group, will split up its investment and retail banking activities, a spokesman said on Friday. The two entities would initially remain under the control of a single holding group, the spokesman said, confirming a report in the German daily Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung. No job cuts were foreseen, he said, speaking after a meeting of Dresdner Bank's supervisory board that sealed the deal. The announcement had been expected because the investment bank division, known as Dresdner Kleinwort, has posed problems for some time and has been hit hard by the US subprime home loan crisis.
MULTIFACETED: A task force has analyzed possible scenarios and created responses to assist domestic industries in dealing with US tariffs, the economics minister said The Executive Yuan is tomorrow to announce countermeasures to US President Donald Trump’s planned reciprocal tariffs, although the details of the plan would not be made public until Monday next week, Minister of Economic Affairs J.W. Kuo (郭智輝) said yesterday. The Cabinet established an economic and trade task force in November last year to deal with US trade and tariff related issues, Kuo told reporters outside the legislature in Taipei. The task force has been analyzing and evaluating all kinds of scenarios to identify suitable responses and determine how best to assist domestic industries in managing the effects of Trump’s tariffs, he
TIGHT-LIPPED: UMC said it had no merger plans at the moment, after Nikkei Asia reported that the firm and GlobalFoundries were considering restarting merger talks United Microelectronics Corp (UMC, 聯電), the world’s No. 4 contract chipmaker, yesterday launched a new US$5 billion 12-inch chip factory in Singapore as part of its latest effort to diversify its manufacturing footprint amid growing geopolitical risks. The new factory, adjacent to UMC’s existing Singapore fab in the Pasir Res Wafer Fab Park, is scheduled to enter volume production next year, utilizing mature 22-nanometer and 28-nanometer process technologies, UMC said in a statement. The company plans to invest US$5 billion during the first phase of the new fab, which would have an installed capacity of 30,000 12-inch wafers per month, it said. The
Taiwan’s official purchasing managers’ index (PMI) last month rose 0.2 percentage points to 54.2, in a second consecutive month of expansion, thanks to front-loading demand intended to avoid potential US tariff hikes, the Chung-Hua Institution for Economic Research (CIER, 中華經濟研究院) said yesterday. While short-term demand appeared robust, uncertainties rose due to US President Donald Trump’s unpredictable trade policy, CIER president Lien Hsien-ming (連賢明) told a news conference in Taipei. Taiwan’s economy this year would be characterized by high-level fluctuations and the volatility would be wilder than most expect, Lien said Demand for electronics, particularly semiconductors, continues to benefit from US technology giants’ effort
‘SWASTICAR’: Tesla CEO Elon Musk’s close association with Donald Trump has prompted opponents to brand him a ‘Nazi’ and resulted in a dramatic drop in sales Demonstrators descended on Tesla Inc dealerships across the US, and in Europe and Canada on Saturday to protest company chief Elon Musk, who has amassed extraordinary power as a top adviser to US President Donald Trump. Waving signs with messages such as “Musk is stealing our money” and “Reclaim our country,” the protests largely took place peacefully following fiery episodes of vandalism on Tesla vehicles, dealerships and other facilities in recent weeks that US officials have denounced as terrorism. Hundreds rallied on Saturday outside the Tesla dealership in Manhattan. Some blasted Musk, the world’s richest man, while others demanded the shuttering of his