Shanghai said yesterday that it has raised prices for liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) to help counter shortages stemming from a gap between local, controlled prices and costs paid by suppliers.
The increase will mainly affect the city’s 280,000 moped drivers, most of whom use scooters for commuting to work.
The benchmark LPG price for scooters and taxis was raised to 4.70 yuan (US$0.68) per liter from 4.20 yuan and 3.60 yuan a liter respectively, an announcement on the city government’s Web site said.
The price hike appeared to be limited to Shanghai.
Shanghai banned the use of gasoline and diesel powered scooters in 2006, leaving city commuters reliant on scooters powered by LPG. Only about 3,000 of the city’s tens of thousands of taxis use LPG, and their drivers will receive subsidies, the government said.
Thanks to losses from the differential between international and local prices, half of the city’s 100 LPG filling stations have closed, forcing scooter drivers to contend with long lines. The government urged operators to reopen stations as quickly as possible.
Similar problems with gasoline and diesel have led to shortages across the country. The government hiked fuel prices by about 11 percent in November but has since frozen them, seeking to avoid a further fanning of inflation that has touched 12-year highs since the beginning of the year.
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) yesterday obtained the government’s approval to inject an additional US$7.5 billion into its US subsidiary, the Department of Investment Review said in a statement. The department approved TSMC’s application of investing in TSMC Arizona Corp, which is engaged in the manufacturing, sales, testing and design of IC and other semiconductor devices, it said. The latest capital injection follows a US$5 billion investment for TSMC Arizona approved in June. The chipmaker has broken ground on two advanced fabs in Arizona with aggregated investments approved by the department totaling US$24 billion thus far. According to TSMC, the first Arizona
The lethal hack of Hezbollah’s Asian-branded pagers and walkie-talkies has sparked an intense search for the devices’ path, revealing a murky market for older technologies where buyers might have few assurances about what they are getting. While supply chains and distribution channels for higher-margin and newer products are tightly managed, that is not the case for older electronics from Asia where counterfeiting, surplus inventories and complex contract manufacturing deals can sometimes make it impossible to identify the source of a product, analysts and consultants say. The response from the companies at the center of the booby-trapped gadgets that killed 37
FRIENDLY TAKEOVER: While Qualcomm Inc’s proposal to buy some or all of Intel raises the prospect of other competitors, Broadcom Inc is staying on the sidelines Qualcomm Inc has approached Intel Corp to discuss a potential acquisition of the struggling chipmaker, people with knowledge of the matter said, raising the prospect of one of the biggest-ever merger and acquisition deals. California-based Qualcomm proposed a friendly takeover for Intel in recent days, said the sources, who asked not to be identified discussing confidential information. The proposal is for all of the chipmaker, although Qualcomm has not ruled out buying some parts of Intel and selling off others. It is uncertain whether the initial approach would lead to an agreement and any deal is likely to come under close antitrust scrutiny
SECURITY CONCERNS: The proposed ban on Chinese autonomous vehicle software and hardware would go into effect with the 2027 and 2030 model years respectively The US Department of Commerce today is expected to propose prohibiting Chinese software and hardware in connected and autonomous vehicles on US roads due to national security concerns, two sources said. US President Joe Biden’s administration has raised concerns about the collection of data by Chinese companies on US drivers and infrastructure as well as the potential foreign manipulation of vehicles connected to the Internet and navigation systems. The proposed regulation would ban the import and sale of vehicles from China with key communications or automated driving system software or hardware, said the two sources, who declined to be identified because the