INVESTMENT
Vertex rises on debut
The first blank-check company to debut in Singapore yesterday rose as much as 5 percent after an offering that attracted strong demand from retail and institutional investors. Vertex Technology Acquisition Corp (VTAC), sponsored by state investor Temasek’s Vertex Venture Holdings Ltd, traded at S$5.25, versus its offering price of S$5 per unit. The special purpose acquisition company’s initial public offering (IPO) is the first for such vehicles in the city-state. It received bids that were 36 times the amount offered for units allocated to retail investors. VTAC raised S$170 million (US$126 million) in the IPO, which can be increased if the overallotment option is exercised.
INVESTMENT
Global FDI jumps 77%
Global foreign direct investment (FDI) flows surpassed their pre-COVID-19 pandemic levels last year, jumping 77 percent to an estimated US$1.65 trillion, the UN Conference on Trade and Development said. The US and other developed economies saw the largest increase in foreign investment flows, which tripled to US$777 billion last year from the previous year, a report published on Wednesday showed. Inward investment in the US grew 114 percent to US$323 billion, due to a surge in cross-border mergers and acquisitions. Foreign direct investment in developing economies grew 30 percent to nearly US$870 billion, led by a 20 percent jump in East and Southeast Asia.
MALAYSIA
Bank holds rates steady
Bank Negara Malaysia yesterday kept its benchmark interest rate at a historic low, maintaining support for an economy hit in recent weeks by floods and the fast-spreading Omicron variant of SARS-CoV-2. The central bank held the overnight policy rate at 1.75 percent at its first monetary policy meeting of the year, as predicted by all 25 economists in a Bloomberg survey. It has held borrowing costs steady since July 2020. The nation expects the economy to expand 5.5 to 6.5 percent this year, up from the 3 to 4 percent growth it forecast for last year.
AIRLINES
United posts quarterly loss
United Airlines Holdings Inc on Wednesday reported another quarterly loss on the lingering drag from COVID-19, but offered an upbeat outlook on a travel comeback later this year and in future years. The US carrier reported a fourth-quarter loss of US$646 million, about one-third of the loss from a year earlier, but far from the US$641 million profit in the 2019 period. Revenues were US$8.2 billion, more than twice the level in 2020, but a 25 percent drop from the figure in the 2019 quarter. United projected its first-quarter capacity would be down 16 to 18 percent compared with 2019 levels. It also expects this year’s capacity to be below that of 2019.
CONSUMER GOODS
Unilever limits GSK offer
Unilever PLC, the maker of Vaseline skin care products and Dove soap, said it would not increase a ￡50 billion (US$68 billion) offer for GlaxoSmithKline PLC’s (GSK) consumer healthcare unit that was rejected last week. The deal made on Dec. 20 comprised ￡41.7 billion in cash and ￡8.3 billion in Unilever shares, but GSK on Saturday said it had rejected the offer from Unilever. “We note the recently shared financial assumptions from the current owners of GSK Consumer Healthcare and have determined that it does not change our view on fundamental value,” Unilever said on Wednesday.
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
Teleperformance SE, the largest call-center operator in the world, is rolling out an artificial intelligence (AI) system that softens English-speaking Indian workers’ accents in real time in a move the company claims would make them more understandable. The technology, called accent translation, coupled with background noise cancelation, is being deployed in call centers in India, where workers provide customer support to some of Teleperformance’s international clients. The company provides outsourced customer support and content moderation to global companies including Apple Inc, ByteDance Ltd’s (字節跳動) TikTok and Samsung Electronics Co Ltd. “When you have an Indian agent on the line, sometimes it’s hard
‘SACRED MOUNTAIN’: The chipmaker can form joint ventures abroad, except in China, but like other firms, it needs government approval for large investments Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) needs government permission for any overseas joint ventures (JVs), but there are no restrictions on making the most advanced chips overseas other than for China, Minister of Economic Affairs J.W. Kuo (郭智輝) said yesterday. US media have said that TSMC, the world’s largest contract chipmaker and a major supplier to companies such as Apple Inc and Nvidia Corp, has been in talks for a stake in Intel Corp. Neither company has confirmed the talks, but US President Donald Trump has accused Taiwan of taking away the US’ semiconductor business and said he wants the industry back
PROBE CONTINUES: Those accused falsely represented that the chips would not be transferred to a person other than the authorized end users, court papers said Singapore charged three men with fraud in a case local media have linked to the movement of Nvidia’s advanced chips from the city-state to Chinese artificial intelligence (AI) firm DeepSeek (深度求索). The US is investigating if DeepSeek, the Chinese company whose AI model’s performance rocked the tech world in January, has been using US chips that are not allowed to be shipped to China, Reuters reported earlier. The Singapore case is part of a broader police investigation of 22 individuals and companies suspected of false representation, amid concerns that organized AI chip smuggling to China has been tracked out of nations such
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