ALAYSIA
Policy rate raised to 3%
Bank Negara Malaysia yesterday unexpectedly raised its benchmark interest rate by a quarter point, as it sought to pre-emptively ward off any risk of future financial imbalance amid lingering price pressures. The central bank hiked the overnight policy rate to 3 percent, a move predicted by just three out of 19 economists in a Bloomberg survey. “The balance of risk to the inflation outlook is tilted to the upside and remains highly subject to any changes to domestic policy including on subsidies and price controls, financial market developments, as well as global commodity prices,” it said in a statement.
TURKEY
Inflation slows, but still high
Inflation slowed below 50 percent for the first time in more than a year, with risks for price stability rising as the country goes to the polls in less than two weeks. Consumer prices grew an annual 43.7 percent last month, down from 50.5 percent in March, official data showed yesterday. Core inflation — which strips out volatile items such as energy and food — was an annual 45.5 percent, down from 47.4 percent in March. While slowing slightly more than expected by economists in a Bloomberg survey, inflation is now forecast to plateau at about 44 to 45 percent for the rest of the year.
AUSTRALIA
Retail sales rise further
Retail sales rose for a third straight month in March, driven primarily by food inflation, as household spending begins to cool under the weight of the Reserve Bank of Australia’s aggressive interest rate increases. Sales advanced 0.4 percent from a month earlier, compared with a forecast 0.2 percent gain, Bureau of Statistics data showed yesterday. Every category outside of food and eating out recorded a decline. The result suggests consumers are beginning to hunker down in the face of rising borrowing costs, in line with the central bank’s aim.
AIRLINES
Lufthansa upbeat on profits
Deutsche Lufthansa AG yesterday said it expected earnings to rise above pre-COVID-19 pandemic levels in the second quarter as air travel continues to recover, putting the carrier closer to achieving its longer-term profit goals. Adjusted earnings before interest and taxes this quarter are forecast to surpass the 754 million euros (US$833 million) achieved in the same period in 2019, Europe’s biggest airline group said in a statement. Lufthansa said summer flights to Spain are particularly popular, with demand for city breaks, a favorite among Europeans before COVID-19 struck, recovering significantly, despite inflation squeezing disposable incomes.
AUTOMAKERS
Stellantis beats forecasts
Stellantis NV’s first-quarter sales climbed more than expected thanks to strong vehicle prices and higher shipments of models like the Jeep Compass. Revenue rose 14 percent to 47.2 billion euros, ahead of analysts’ expectations of 45.8 billion euros, the maker of Ram pickups and Fiat cars said yesterday. The company reaffirmed full-year guidance for a double-digit adjusted operating income margin and positive industrial free cash flow. Stellantis, which has been battling logistics snags, particularly in Europe, said new vehicle inventory was at 1.3 million at the end of March, reflecting a return to more normal levels. Shipments during the quarter rose 7 percent after the availability of semiconductors improved.
The New Taiwan dollar is on the verge of overtaking the yuan as Asia’s best carry-trade target given its lower risk of interest-rate and currency volatility. A strategy of borrowing the New Taiwan dollar to invest in higher-yielding alternatives has generated the second-highest return over the past month among Asian currencies behind the yuan, based on the Sharpe ratio that measures risk-adjusted relative returns. The New Taiwan dollar may soon replace its Chinese peer as the region’s favored carry trade tool, analysts say, citing Beijing’s efforts to support the yuan that can create wild swings in borrowing costs. In contrast,
Nvidia Corp’s demand for advanced packaging from Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電) remains strong though the kind of technology it needs is changing, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) said yesterday, after he was asked whether the company was cutting orders. Nvidia’s most advanced artificial intelligence (AI) chip, Blackwell, consists of multiple chips glued together using a complex chip-on-wafer-on-substrate (CoWoS) advanced packaging technology offered by TSMC, Nvidia’s main contract chipmaker. “As we move into Blackwell, we will use largely CoWoS-L. Of course, we’re still manufacturing Hopper, and Hopper will use CowoS-S. We will also transition the CoWoS-S capacity to CoWos-L,” Huang said
Nvidia Corp CEO Jensen Huang (黃仁勳) is expected to miss the inauguration of US president-elect Donald Trump on Monday, bucking a trend among high-profile US technology leaders. Huang is visiting East Asia this week, as he typically does around the time of the Lunar New Year, a person familiar with the situation said. He has never previously attended a US presidential inauguration, said the person, who asked not to be identified, because the plans have not been announced. That makes Nvidia an exception among the most valuable technology companies, most of which are sending cofounders or CEOs to the event. That includes
INDUSTRY LEADER: TSMC aims to continue outperforming the industry’s growth and makes 2025 another strong growth year, chairman and CEO C.C. Wei says Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), a major chip supplier to Nvidia Corp and Apple Inc, yesterday said it aims to grow revenue by about 25 percent this year, driven by robust demand for artificial intelligence (AI) chips. That means TSMC would continue to outpace the foundry industry’s 10 percent annual growth this year based on the chipmaker’s estimate. The chipmaker expects revenue from AI-related chips to double this year, extending a three-fold increase last year. The growth would quicken over the next five years at a compound annual growth rate of 45 percent, fueled by strong demand for the high-performance computing
RSS