AUSTRALIA
Canberra holds WTO case
The government is to temporarily suspend its WTO case against China over tariffs on barley, while Beijing undertakes a three-month review of the restrictions, in a potential breakthrough to the long-running dispute between the nations. Minister for Foreign Affairs Penny Wong (黃英賢) yesterday announced the agreement alongside Minister for Trade and Tourism Don Farrell at a news conference in Adelaide, saying they were hopeful of a similar agreement for China’s tariffs on Australian wine. “We are hopeful that at the end of that review process the impediments that currently exist will be suspended or removed and that we can get back to normal trade with China,” Farrell said.
JAPAN
Buffett eyeing Japan stocks
Warren Buffett is turning his focus back to Japan as he intends to boost his investments in the country, the Nikkei reported. Shares of major trading houses — Mitsubishi Corp, Mitsui & Co, Marubeni Corp, Sumitomo Corp and Itochu Corp — yesterday rose after Buffett said he had raised Berkshire Hathaway Inc’s holdings in them to 7.4 percent from about 5 percent in 2020 and is looking to increase his exposure to Japanese stocks, the Nikkei report said. “This may encourage foreign investors to invest in Japanese stocks, especially in value stocks,” T&D Asset Management Co chief strategist Hiroshi Namioka said.
SOUTH KOREA
Regulator fines Google
The Korea Fair Trade Commission has fined Alphabet Inc’s Google 42.1 billion won (US$31.83 million) for blocking the release of mobile video games on a competitor’s platform. The commission yesterday said that Google bolstered its market dominance, and hurt local app market One Store’s revenue and value as a platform, by requiring video game makers to exclusively release their titles on Google Play in exchange for providing in-app exposure between June 2016 and April 2018. Game makers affected by Google’s action include Netmarble Corp, Nexon Co and NCSOFT Corp, as well as other smaller companies, the antitrust regulator said.
NEW ZEALAND
House sales tumble
House sales fell to a record low in the three months through December as interest-rate hikes and plunging property prices pushed buyers to the sidelines. Sales of residential and lifestyle properties fell to 13,890 in the fourth quarter last year, which was the lowest since records began in 1990, according to CoreLogic New Zealand data published yesterday by the Reserve Bank in Wellington. The volume is below the previous low of 15,579 seen during the 2008 global financial crisis. The CoreLogic data includes all settled property sales and the third-quarter sales were revised to 15,880 from 14,996 previously.
AVIATION
Airbus deliveries down 9%
Airbus SE delivered 127 jets in the first quarter, a 9 percent drop from a year earlier, as shortages of parts such as engines spilled into the new year. Deliveries totaled 61 aircraft in March, the world’s biggest maker of commercial jetliners said yesterday in a statement. The lower first-quarter tally would make it harder for Airbus to reach its goal of increasing deliveries to 720 aircraft this year. Airbus delivered 661 aircraft last year, after lowering its initial target. It handed over 140 jetliners in the first quarter of last year.
Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) yesterday said that its investment plan in Arizona is going according to schedule, following a local media report claiming that the company is planning to break ground on its third wafer fab in the US in June. In a statement, TSMC said it does not comment on market speculation, but that its investments in Arizona are proceeding well. TSMC is investing more than US$65 billion in Arizona to build three advanced wafer fabs. The first one has started production using the 4-nanometer (nm) process, while the second one would start mass production using the
A TAIWAN DEAL: TSMC is in early talks to fully operate Intel’s US semiconductor factories in a deal first raised by Trump officials, but Intel’s interest is uncertain Broadcom Inc has had informal talks with its advisers about making a bid for Intel Corp’s chip-design and marketing business, the Wall Street Journal reported, citing people familiar with the matter. Nothing has been submitted to Intel and Broadcom could decide not to pursue a deal, according to the Journal. Bloomberg News earlier reported that Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) is in early talks for a controlling stake in Intel’s factories at the request of officials at US President Donald Trump’s administration, as the president looks to boost US manufacturing and maintain the country’s leadership in critical technologies. Trump officials raised the
‘SILVER LINING’: Although the news caused TSMC to fall on the local market, an analyst said that as tariffs are not set to go into effect until April, there is still time for negotiations US President Donald Trump on Tuesday said that he would likely impose tariffs on semiconductor, automobile and pharmaceutical imports of about 25 percent, with an announcement coming as soon as April 2 in a move that would represent a dramatic widening of the US leader’s trade war. “I probably will tell you that on April 2, but it’ll be in the neighborhood of 25 percent,” Trump told reporters at his Mar-a-Lago club when asked about his plan for auto tariffs. Asked about similar levies on pharmaceutical drugs and semiconductors, the president said that “it’ll be 25 percent and higher, and it’ll
CHIP BOOM: Revenue for the semiconductor industry is set to reach US$1 trillion by 2032, opening up opportunities for the chip pacakging and testing company, it said ASE Technology Holding Co (日月光投控), the world’s largest provider of outsourced semiconductor assembly and test (OSAT) services, yesterday launched a new advanced manufacturing facility in Penang, Malaysia, aiming to meet growing demand for emerging technologies such as generative artificial intelligence (AI) applications. The US$300 million facility is a critical step in expanding ASE’s global footprint, offering an alternative for customers from the US, Europe, Japan, South Korea and China to assemble and test chips outside of Taiwan amid efforts to diversify supply chains. The plant, the company’s fifth in Malaysia, is part of a strategic expansion plan that would more than triple
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