OIL
OPEC mulls coordinated cuts
The OPEC+ coalition is rushing to pull together a meeting of its members — and possibly other oil producing nations — after US President Donald Trump called for a coordinated production cut to stem the historic rout in crude prices. A virtual meeting is to be held on Monday, a delegate said. It will be open to all producers — not just OPEC members and allies — but it is not yet clear which will attend, the delegates said. The US so far has given no indication it is prepared to join. The guest list is crucial as Saudi Arabia has made clear it would only cut production if others, including the US, shoulder some of the burden. Saudi Arabia called for the meeting, saying it should aim for a “fair agreement.”
JAPAN
Households to get ¥300,000
The government is planning to distribute ¥300,000 (US$2,766) to virus-hit households as part of its biggest-ever stimulus package, but will not lower its sales tax, the ruling Liberal Democratic Party (LDP) said yesterday. Prime Minister Shinzo Abe approved the value of the handouts ahead of the announcement of the package next week, LDP policy head Fumio Kishida said after meeting Abe and Minister of Finance Taro Aso. The details emerged three days after the party unveiled a ¥60 trillion package of measures aimed at supporting households and businesses battered by the fallout from the coronavirus pandemic.The party also approved emergency tax changes to be part of the package, LDP tax policy head Akira Amari said.
NORWAY
Jobless rate jumps to 14.7%
The unemployment rate rose sixfold last month to a record 14.7 percent, the Labor and Welfare Agency (NAV) said yesterday, as the economy ground to a halt amid efforts to curb the COVID-19 pandemic. As many as 10.7 percent were fully unemployed, while the remaining 3 percent were registered as partially unemployed, NAV added. The government three weeks ago announced emergency shutdowns of many public and private institutions, including schools and kindergartens, sending the economy into a tailspin and triggering hundreds of thousands of layoffs. Although many job cuts were classified as temporary, such as restaurants and airlines expecting to bring back employees when restrictions are eventually lifted, economists have said that many firms might struggle to recover.
EUROPEAN UNION
PMI hits a record low
Eurozone business activity collapsed last month as attempts to contain the COVID-19 pandemic pushed governments across the continent to shut down vast swathes of their economies, from shops to factories to restaurants, a survey showed yesterday. IHS Markit’s final composite purchasing managers’ index (PMI) plummeted to a record low of 29.7 last month from February’s 51.6, lower than the flash reading of 31.4 and marking by far its biggest one-month drop since the survey began in July 1998. “The data indicate that the eurozone economy is already contracting at an annualized rate approaching 10 percent, with worse inevitably to come in the near future,” IHS Markit chief business economist Chris Williamson said. The new business index sank to 27.7 from 51.2, much weaker than the flash reading of 29.5. Activity in the bloc’s dominant service industry also almost ground to a halt. Its PMI dropped to a survey-low of 26.4 from February’s 52.6, below the preliminary estimate of 28.4.
Among the rows of vibrators, rubber torsos and leather harnesses at a Chinese sex toys exhibition in Shanghai this weekend, the beginnings of an artificial intelligence (AI)-driven shift in the industry quietly pulsed. China manufactures about 70 percent of the world’s sex toys, most of it the “hardware” on display at the fair — whether that be technicolor tentacled dildos or hyper-realistic personalized silicone dolls. Yet smart toys have been rising in popularity for some time. Many major European and US brands already offer tech-enhanced products that can enable long-distance love, monitor well-being and even bring people one step closer to
Malaysia’s leader yesterday announced plans to build a massive semiconductor design park, aiming to boost the Southeast Asian nation’s role in the global chip industry. A prominent player in the semiconductor industry for decades, Malaysia accounts for an estimated 13 percent of global back-end manufacturing, according to German tech giant Bosch. Now it wants to go beyond production and emerge as a chip design powerhouse too, Malaysian Prime Minister Anwar Ibrahim said. “I am pleased to announce the largest IC (integrated circuit) Design Park in Southeast Asia, that will house world-class anchor tenants and collaborate with global companies such as Arm [Holdings PLC],”
Sales in the retail, and food and beverage sectors last month continued to rise, increasing 0.7 percent and 13.6 percent respectively from a year earlier, setting record highs for the month of March, the Ministry of Economic Affairs said yesterday. Sales in the wholesale sector also grew last month by 4.6 annually, mainly due to the business opportunities for emerging applications related to artificial intelligence (AI) and high-performance computing technologies, the ministry said in a report. The ministry forecast that retail, and food and beverage sales this month would retain their growth momentum as the former would benefit from Tomb Sweeping Day
Thousands of parents in Singapore are furious after a Cordlife Group Ltd (康盛人生集團), a major operator of cord blood banks in Asia, irreparably damaged their children’s samples through improper handling, with some now pursuing legal action. The ongoing case, one of the worst to hit the largely untested industry, has renewed concerns over companies marketing themselves to anxious parents with mostly unproven assurances. This has implications across the region, given Cordlife’s operations in Hong Kong, Macau, Indonesia, the Philippines and India. The parents paid for years to have their infants’ cord blood stored, with the understanding that the stem cells they contained