■TECHNOLOGY
Apple shares at highest ever
Apple shares hit an all-time high on Wall Street on Friday at the end of a week during which the tech firm said it sold a single-day record number of iPhones. Apple shares hit US$275 dollars during the day’s trading before closing at US$274.07, a gain of 0.81 percent for the day. The Cupertino, California-based company said on Tuesday that it had received 600,000 pre-orders for the new iPhone, the most ever in a single day. Last month, Apple dethroned software giant Microsoft as the largest US technology company in terms of market value. The only US company with a larger market capitalization than Apple is ExxonMobil.
■SPAIN
Debt outlook positive
IMF Managing Director Dominique Strauss-Kahn said Friday he was confident about the future of the Spanish economy and he praised recent government measures aimed at restoring it to health. “I’m confident. That’s the main message I want to give,” Strauss-Kahn said after talks Friday with Prime Minister Jose Luis Rodriguez Zapatero. Strauss-Kahn pointed out that the country’s debt ratio — currently at 66 percent of GDP — compares very favorably against those of France and Germany. He also said that its lower public and private debt situations made comparison with neighboring Portugal irrelevant.
■BANKING
Italian banks pan tax plan
The association representing Italian banks on Friday criticized an EU plan to introduce bank levies, saying the measure might tighten credit for families and businesses and hurt the economy as a whole. Taxes on banks would “reduce resources the system has so far guaranteed for families and businesses” in Italy, the association said in a statement. “A new tax would further burden banks and the entire economy.” At a summit in Brussels on Thursday, the 27 EU heads of state and government agreed to introduce bank taxes that could fund future bailouts in the wake of Europe’s debt crisis, though they were short on details.
■BANKING
Nevada Security shut down
US regulators on Friday shut down a Nevada bank, raising to 83 the number of US bank failures this year. The US Federal Deposit Insurance Corp took over Nevada Security Bank, based in Reno, with US$480.3 million in assets and US$479.8 million in deposits. Umpqua Bank, based in Roseburg, Oregon, agreed to assume the assets and deposits of the failed bank. With 83 closures nationwide so far this year, the pace of bank failures is more than double that of last year, which was already a brisk year for shutdowns. The number of bank failures is expected to peak this year and be slightly higher than the 140 that fell last year. That was the highest annual tally since 1992, at the height of the savings and loan crisis.
■STEEL
ThyssenKrupp plant opens
Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva inaugurated on Friday a huge steel-making complex built jointly by German steelmaker ThyssenKrupp and Brazil’s Vale mining company. The US$6.4 billion ThyssenKrupp CSA Siderurgica do Atlantico plant is located in Rio de Janeiro and has an annual production capacity of 5 million tonnes of steel slabs. ThyssenKrupp AG has a 73 percent stake in the new venture and Vale SA has 27 percent. Vale is the world’s largest producer of iron ore.
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) would not produce its most advanced technologies in the US next year, Minister of Economic Affairs J.W. Kuo (郭智輝) said yesterday. Kuo made the comment during an appearance at the legislature, hours after the chipmaker announced that it would invest an additional US$100 billion to expand its manufacturing operations in the US. Asked by Taiwan People’s Party Legislator-at-large Chang Chi-kai (張啟楷) if TSMC would allow its most advanced technologies, the yet-to-be-released 2-nanometer and 1.6-nanometer processes, to go to the US in the near term, Kuo denied it. TSMC recently opened its first US factory, which produces 4-nanometer
PROTECTION: The investigation, which takes aim at exporters such as Canada, Germany and Brazil, came days after Trump unveiled tariff hikes on steel and aluminum products US President Donald Trump on Saturday ordered a probe into potential tariffs on lumber imports — a move threatening to stoke trade tensions — while also pushing for a domestic supply boost. Trump signed an executive order instructing US Secretary of Commerce Howard Lutnick to begin an investigation “to determine the effects on the national security of imports of timber, lumber and their derivative products.” The study might result in new tariffs being imposed, which would pile on top of existing levies. The investigation takes aim at exporters like Canada, Germany and Brazil, with White House officials earlier accusing these economies of
GREAT SUCCESS: Republican Senator Todd Young expressed surprise at Trump’s comments and said he expects the administration to keep the program running US lawmakers who helped secure billions of dollars in subsidies for domestic semiconductor manufacturing rejected US President Donald Trump’s call to revoke the 2022 CHIPS and Science Act, signaling that any repeal effort in the US Congress would fall short. US Senate Minority Leader Chuck Schumer, who negotiated the law, on Wednesday said that Trump’s demand would fail, while a top Republican proponent, US Senator Todd Young, expressed surprise at the president’s comments and said he expects the administration to keep the program running. The CHIPS Act is “essential for America leading the world in tech, leading the world in AI [artificial
REACTIONS: While most analysts were positive about TSMC’s investment, one said the US expansion could disrupt the company’s supply-demand balance Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co’s (TSMC, 台積電) new US$100 billion investment in the US would exert a positive effect on the chipmaker’s revenue in the medium term on the back of booming artificial intelligence (AI) chip demand from US chip designers, an International Data Corp (IDC) analyst said yesterday. “This is good for TSMC in terms of business expansion, as its major clients for advanced chips are US chip designers,” IDC senior semiconductor research manager Galen Zeng (曾冠瑋) said by telephone yesterday. “Besides, those US companies all consider supply chain resilience a business imperative,” Zeng said. That meant local supply would
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