■BIOTECHNOLOGY
US states sue Amgen Inc
Amgen Inc, the world’s largest biotechnology company, is being sued by 15 US states after a probe into an alleged nationwide kickback scheme that aimed to boost sales, New York’s attorney-general said on Friday. Attorney-general Andrew Cuomo said Amgen and two units of AmerisourceBergen Corp offered kickbacks to physicians and others to increase sales of the anemia medicine Aranesp. The complaint charges that the companies gave free samples of Aranesp to medical providers such as physicians, then encouraged them to bill insurance companies and the government’s Medicaid program for reimbursement.
■FOREIGN EXCHANGE
Stiglitz weighs in on yuan
Nobel Prize-winning economist Joseph Stiglitz said “there will have to be some adjustments in the exchange rate” between China’s yuan and the dollar. “It is very difficult to maintain fixed exchange rates in a very volatile economy for a very long period of time, which is why the world has abandoned the fixed exchange rate system,” he said in a speech in Shanghai yesterday. He said the US economy was still “nowhere near” the end of its recession and the labor market was in “very bad shape.”
■BANKING
Executives to meet with Fed
Executives of the US’ 28 largest banks will meet with Federal Reserve supervisors tomorrow to discuss the Fed’s plan to police bank pay policies, officials said on Friday. Under a plan recently put forward by the Fed, the central bank would review — and could veto — pay policies that could cause too much risk-taking by bank executives, traders or loan officers.
■INTERNET
Spam king ordered to pay
Spam king Sanford Wallace has been ordered to pay US$711 million in damages for bombarding Facebook members with unwanted messages, the social networking site said on Friday. The award was made at the San Jose District Court on Thursday, according to the announcement. Facebook said Wallace’s e-mails tricked many recipients into giving him their login information, or redirecting them to sites that paid him for each visit. It said Wallace committed 14 million violations of US anti-spam laws. In addition to the damages, Wallace was banned from accessing Facebook and slapped with a criminal contempt of court charge, which means he now faces possible jail time.
■PETROLEUM
Chevron lifted Q3 production
Chevron said on Friday it pumped its way through a weak third quarter, producing more oil as prices recovered from a severe plunge earlier in the year. The second-largest US oil and gas producer boosted revenues by increasing oil production by 11 percent. Its average sale price for crude and natural gas liquids over the past three months was US$62 per barrel, which is better than the previous quarter, but below the US$103 it fetched during the same period last year.
■AVIATION
EVA Air narrows loss
EVA Airways Corp (長榮航空), Taiwan’s second-largest air carrier, reported a nine-month loss that narrowed to NT$3.9 billion (US$120 million), or NT$1.67 a share, from a loss of NT$10.5 billion, or NT$4.65 a share, a year earlier, according to a stock exchange filing on Friday. EVA posted a NT$2.22 billion third-quarter loss compared with NT$4.51 billion a year earlier, while third-quarter sales fell 22 percent from a year earlier to NT$18.7 billion.
COMPETITION: AMD, Intel and Qualcomm are unveiling new laptop and desktop parts in Las Vegas, arguing their technologies provide the best performance for AI workloads Advanced Micro Devices Inc (AMD), the second-biggest maker of computer processors, said its chips are to be used by Dell Technologies Inc for the first time in PCs sold to businesses. The chipmaker unveiled new processors it says would make AMD-based PCs the best at running artificial intelligence (AI) software. Dell has decided to use the chips in some of its computers aimed at business customers, AMD executives said at CES in Las Vegas on Monday. Dell’s embrace of AMD for corporate PCs — it already uses the chipmaker for consumer devices — is another blow for Intel Corp as the company
STIMULUS PLANS: An official said that China would increase funding from special treasury bonds and expand another program focused on key strategic sectors China is to sharply increase funding from ultra-long treasury bonds this year to spur business investment and consumer-boosting initiatives, a state planner official told a news conference yesterday, as Beijing cranks up fiscal stimulus to revitalize its faltering economy. Special treasury bonds would be used to fund large-scale equipment upgrades and consumer goods trade-ins, said Yuan Da (袁達), deputy secretary-general of the Chinese National Development and Reform Commission. “The size of ultra-long special government bond funds will be sharply increased this year to intensify and expand the implementation of the two new initiatives,” Yuan said. Under the program launched last year, consumers can
Citigroup Inc and Bank of America Corp said they are leaving a global climate-banking group, becoming the latest Wall Street lenders to exit the coalition in the past month. In a statement, Citigroup said while it remains committed to achieving net zero emissions, it is exiting the Net-Zero Banking Alliance (NZBA). Bank of America said separately on Tuesday that it is also leaving NZBA, adding that it would continue to work with clients on reducing greenhouse gas emissions. The banks’ departure from NZBA follows Goldman Sachs Group Inc and Wells Fargo & Co. The largest US financial institutions are under increasing pressure
FUTURE TECH: Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang would give the keynote speech at this year’s Consumer Electronics Show, which is also expected to highlight autonomous vehicles Gadgets, robots and vehicles imbued with artificial intelligence (AI) would once again vie for attention at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) this week, as vendors behind the scenes would seek ways to deal with tariffs threatened by US president-elect Donald Trump. The annual Consumer Electronics Show opens formally in Las Vegas tomorrow, but preceding days are packed with product announcements. AI would be a major theme of the show, along with autonomous vehicles ranging from tractors and boats to lawn mowers and golf club trollies. “Everybody is going to be talking about AI,” Creative Strategies Inc analyst Carolina Milanesi said. “From fridges to ovens
RSS