TECHNOLOGY
Intel to cut Mobileye stake
Intel Corp plans to sell part of its holdings in Mobileye Global Inc, to raise about US$1.48 billion for its ambitious spending plans. The US company is offering 35 million shares with an option to sell a further 5.25 million shares of the Israeli automated driving technology maker, Mobileye said on Monday in a regulatory filing. Mobileye stock has more than doubled since its initial public offering in October last year. Goldman Sachs Group Inc and Morgan Stanley are to underwrite the sale. Following the sale, Intel would retain about an 88 percent stake in Mobileye, which it bought in 2018 for US$15.3 billion.
CHINA
Deposit rates to shrink
Authorities have asked the nation’s biggest banks to lower their deposit rates for at least the second time in less than a year, people familiar with the matter said. Several state-owned lenders were last week advised to cut rates on a range of products, including on demand deposits by 5 basis points and three-year and five-year time deposits by at least 10 basis points, the people said. Banks are assessing the request and could adjust rates as early as this week, they said. Big lenders currently offer an annualized rate of 0.25 percent on demand deposits, and 2.6 percent and 2.65 percent on three-year and five-year time deposits respectively.
GERMANY
Industrial orders drop again
Industrial orders unexpectedly fell again in April following a sharp drop the month before, official data showed yesterday, adding to concerns about the health of Europe’s biggest economy. New orders, closely watched as a foretaste of future industrial activity, declined 0.4 percent in April from a month earlier, federal statistics agency Destatis said. The drop comes after orders plummeted 10.9 percent in March, the biggest decline since April 2020 when the COVID-19 pandemic forced widespread lockdowns.
JAPAN
Real wage slide continues
Workers’ real wages continued to fall in April, even after reflecting some of the gains from a solid win in annual pay negotiations, creating a headache for Prime Minister Fumio Kishida as he considers calling an election. Real cash earnings for workers dropped 3 percent from a year earlier in April, slipping for the 13th month, the Ministry of Health, Labour and Welfare reported yesterday. Nominal cash earnings increased 1 percent from the previous year, it said. A separate report showed that households cut spending in April, an indication that higher prices are sapping consumers’ spending appetite. Household outlays fell 4.4 percent from a year earlier, it said.
GAMING
Microsoft to settle charges
Microsoft Corp is to pay US$20 million to settle government charges that it collected personal information from children without their parents’ consent, officials said on Monday. The US Federal Trade Commission alleged that from 2015 to 2020 Microsoft collected personal data from children under the age of 13 who signed up to its Xbox gaming system without their parents’ permission and retained the information. The decision still needs the approval of a federal court before it can be implemented. A spokesperson for Microsoft said that Xbox would develop an identity and age validation process to deliver age-appropriate experiences.
UNPRECEDENTED PACE: Micron Technology has announced plans to expand manufacturing capabilities with the acquisition of a new chip plant in Miaoli Micron Technology Inc unveiled a newly acquired chip plant in Miaoli County yesterday, as the company expands capacity to meet growing demand for advanced DRAM chips, including high-bandwidth memory chips amid the artificial intelligence boom. The plant in Miaoli County’s Tongluo Township (銅鑼), which Micron acquired from Powerchip Semiconductor Manufacturing Corp (力積電) for US$1.8 billion, is expected to make a sizeable capacity contribution to the company from fiscal 2028, the company said in a statement. It would be an extended production site of Micron’s large-scale manufacturing hub in Taichung, the company said. As the global semiconductor industry is racing to reach US$1 trillion
Singapore-based ride-hailing and delivery giant Grab Holdings Ltd has applied for regulatory approval to acquire the Taiwan operations of Germany-based Delivery Hero SE's Foodpanda in a deal valued at about US$600 million. Grab submitted the filing to the Fair Trade Commission on Friday last week, with the transaction subject to regulatory review and approval, the company said in a statement yesterday. Its independent governance structure would help foster a healthy and competitive market in Taiwan if the deal is approved, Grab said. Grab, which is listed on the NASDAQ, said in the filing that US-based Uber Technologies Inc holds about 13 percent of
Taiwan’s food delivery market could undergo a major shift if Singapore-based Grab Holdings Ltd completes its planned acquisition of Delivery Hero SE’s Foodpanda business in Taiwan, industry experts said. Grab on Monday last week announced it would acquire Foodpanda’s Taiwan operations for US$600 million. The deal is expected to be finalized in the second half of this year, with Grab aiming to complete user migration to its platform by the first half of next year. A duopoly between Uber Eats and Foodpanda dominates Taiwan’s delivery market, a structure that has remained intact since the Fair Trade Commission (FTC) blocked Uber Technologies Inc’s
Memory chip stocks extended their losses yesterday after Alphabet Inc’s Google publicized research that could allow more efficient use of the storage needed for artificial intelligence (AI) development. SK Hynix Inc and Samsung Electronics Co, South Korean leaders in the market, fell more than 6 percent and about 5 percent respectively in Seoul. In the US, Micron Technology Inc, Western Digital Corp and Sandisk Corp slid more than 2 percent in pre-market trading, after they all closed lower on Wednesday. Memory companies have been on a tear in recent months as the rapid development of AI infrastructure triggered a spike in chip
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