■FINANCE
D&B responds to report
More than 90 percent of companies in Taiwan have low financial risk, an executive of the Taiwan branch of the world’s largest business information provider, Dun & Bradstreet Corp (D&B), said on Friday. The statement came one day after D&B International Ltd Taiwan was quoted by the Chinese-language Economic Daily News as saying that more than 20 publicly listed companies were in dire financial straits. Alexander Lo (羅立基), general manager of the Taiwan branch, said the US-based company had not provided any such data. Lo said the D&B Paydex report cited in the news story was simply one of the factors used to evaluate a company’s financial risk. A D&B statement also explained that 92 percent of the 94,926 Taiwanese companies in its database were at the lowest level of financial risk.
■ENERGY
Electricity bills down
More than 4.7 million households and public schools around the country benefited from pricing incentives to conserve energy, collectively saving NT$1.74 billion (US$54.17 million) on their electricity bills for July and last month, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said on Friday. The Bureau of Energy said in a statement that because of the incentives, families and schools had saved 1.17 billion kilowatts per hour in electricity compared with a year earlier. The savings represent a 740,000-tonne reduction in carbon dioxide emissions, based on the formula of 1.637kg of emissions per 1kWh of electricity, the statement said.
■CLOTHING
H&M opens shop in Japan
Swedish clothing giant Hennes and Mauritz (H&M) opened its first outlet in Japan yesterday, where competition in the casual fashion industry is fierce. More than 3,000 people, mostly women in their 20s and 30s, lined up at the company’s first store in Tokyo’s shopping district of Ginza ahead of a ribbon-cutting ceremony. Japan becomes the 30th country with H&M outlets. The company has 1,600 shops and 800 production bases worldwide. Rolf Eriksen, chief executive of the Stockholm-based company, recently told Japanese media that he plans to expand outlets across the country. It has already decided to open two more stores in the capital’s leading fashion districts of Harajuku and Shibuya.
■TELECOMS
PRC firms win contracts
Chinese telecom firms Huawei (華為) and ZTE (中興通訊) have won contracts worth US$75 million to expand the mobile phone network in Libya, the state-run telecommunications office said on Friday. A total of US$58 million has been awarded to expand the existing network of the Libyana public mobile phone company from 1 million lines to 6.5 million lines, a statement said. ZTE and Huawei will also expand the mobile network along the Libyan coast.
■FOOD
Campbell recalls soup
Campbell Soup Asia Ltd has recalled 330,000 cans of soup in Hong Kong and Macau after fielding complaints that some cans emitted an “objectionable smell,” the company said on Friday. It is the first time Campbell has called back products in Asia, Campbell commercial director Heidi Nam said through a spokeswoman. The recall covered cans of condensed cream of mushroom soup and creamy chicken mushroom soup manufactured in Malaysia, Nam said. All cans were exclusively distributed in Hong Kong and Macau, she said.
‘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
ADVERSARIES: The new list includes 11 entities in China and one in Taiwan, which is a local branch of Chinese cloud computing firm Inspur Group The US added dozens of entities to a trade blacklist on Tuesday, the US Department of Commerce said, in part to disrupt Beijing’s artificial intelligence (AI) and advanced computing capabilities. The action affects 80 entities from countries including China, the United Arab Emirates and Iran, with the commerce department citing their “activities contrary to US national security and foreign policy.” Those added to the “entity list” are restricted from obtaining US items and technologies without government authorization. “We will not allow adversaries to exploit American technology to bolster their own militaries and threaten American lives,” US Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick said. The entities
Minister of Finance Chuang Tsui-yun (莊翠雲) yesterday told lawmakers that she “would not speculate,” but a “response plan” has been prepared in case Taiwan is targeted by US President Donald Trump’s reciprocal tariffs, which are to be announced on Wednesday next week. The Trump administration, including US Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent, has said that much of the proposed reciprocal tariffs would focus on the 15 countries that have the highest trade surpluses with the US. Bessent has referred to those countries as the “dirty 15,” but has not named them. Last year, Taiwan’s US$73.9 billion trade surplus with the US
Prices of gasoline and diesel products at domestic gas stations are to fall NT$0.2 and NT$0.1 per liter respectively this week, even though international crude oil prices rose last week, CPC Corp, Taiwan (台灣中油) and Formosa Petrochemical Corp (台塑石化) said yesterday. International crude oil prices continued rising last week, as the US Energy Information Administration reported a larger-than-expected drop in US commercial crude oil inventories, CPC said in a statement. Based on the company’s floating oil price formula, the cost of crude oil rose 2.38 percent last week from a week earlier, it said. News that US President Donald Trump plans a “secondary
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