THAILAND
Forex rules to be relaxed
The country plans to ease foreign exchange rules for domestic companies and individuals to help them shore up their risk management. The Bank of Thailand aims to promote the use of the local currency among local businesses and cut their reliance on US dollars by transacting more in currencies such as the yuan, yen, ringgit and rupiah, Alisara Mahasandana, assistant governor for the Bank of Thailand’s financial markets operations group, said yesterday. The central bank would raise the limit on grant money transfer — without underlying transactions — to US$200,000 from US$50,000, Alisara said. It would also double the threshold on direct overseas investment in equities for individuals to US$10 million annually from US$5 million, she said.
NEW ZEALAND
Second recession forecast
The nation could emerge from recession this quarter but it would quickly stumble into another one, said economists at three of the nation’s biggest banks, who predict a second recession beginning later this year. “Economic momentum has ground to a halt,” said Mike Jones, chief economist at Bank of New Zealand in Wellington. “It looks as if this broad state of affairs will be with us until at least the end of the year.” The Bank of New Zealand now expects the economy to contract in the final quarter of this year and the first quarter of next year.
CONGLOMERATES
Cheng family to buy out NWS
Hong Kong’s billionaire Cheng (鄭) family is offering to buy the NWS Holdings Ltd (新創建集團) shares that it does not own and take the company private in a HK$35.5 billion (US$4.5 billion) deal. Chow Tai Fook Enterprises Ltd (周大福集團), the property dynasty’s investment holdings flagship, made an offer of HK$9.15 per share, the Hong Kong stock exchange said in a statement yesterday. The offer is a 14.5 percent premium over the last closing price. New World Development Co (新世界發展), which holds 2.38 billion NWS shares, would receive about HK$21.8 billion from the disposal, the statement said.
TECHNOLOGY
Baidu says it beats ChatGPT
Baidu Inc’s (百度) ChatGPT-style service has outperformed OpenAI’s seminal product on several measures, China’s search leader said yesterday. Ernie 3.5, the latest iteration of Baidu’s foundation model, has surpassed OpenAI’s chatbot built on GPT-3.5 in general abilities, and outperformed the more advanced GPT-4 on several Chinese-language capabilities, the company said in a statement. It cited a test by state newspaper China Science Daily, based on datasets including AGIEval and C-Eval, benchmarks designed for evaluating such AI models. The Beijing-based search provider debuted Ernie Bot in March.
ENERGY
Ugandans sue TotalEnergies
Twenty-six Ugandans yesterday sued French oil giant TotalEnergies SE in Paris for reparations over alleged human rights violations at its massive megaprojects in the country. Joined by five Ugandan and French aid groups, people from the affected communities said that the energy firm caused “serious harm,” especially to their rights to land and food. At the heart of their complaint are two vast TotalEnergies developments: the Tilenga exploration of 419 oil wells, one-third of them in Uganda’s largest national park, Murchison Falls, and the East African Crude Oil Pipeline project, a 1,500km pipeline taking crude oil to the Tanzanian coast through protected nature reserves.
Semiconductor business between Taiwan and the US is a “win-win” model for both sides given the high level of complementarity, the government said yesterday responding to tariff threats from US President Donald Trump. Home to the world’s largest contract chipmaker, Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co (TSMC, 台積電), Taiwan is a key link in the global technology supply chain for companies such as Apple Inc and Nvidia Corp. Trump said on Monday he plans to impose tariffs on imported chips, pharmaceuticals and steel in an effort to get the producers to make them in the US. “Taiwan and the US semiconductor and other technology industries
SMALL AND EFFICIENT: The Chinese AI app’s initial success has spurred worries in the US that its tech giants’ massive AI spending needs re-evaluation, a market strategist said Chinese artificial intelligence (AI) start-up DeepSeek’s (深度求索) eponymous AI assistant rocketed to the top of Apple Inc’s iPhone download charts, stirring doubts in Silicon Valley about the strength of the US’ technological dominance. The app’s underlying AI model is widely seen as competitive with OpenAI and Meta Platforms Inc’s latest. Its claim that it cost much less to train and develop triggered share moves across Asia’s supply chain. Chinese tech firms linked to DeepSeek, such as Iflytek Co (科大訊飛), surged yesterday, while chipmaking tool makers like Advantest Corp slumped on the potential threat to demand for Nvidia Corp’s AI accelerators. US stock
The US Federal Reserve is expected to announce a pause in rate cuts on Wednesday, as policymakers look to continue tackling inflation under close and vocal scrutiny from US President Donald Trump. The Fed cut its key lending rate by a full percentage point in the final four months of last year and indicated it would move more cautiously going forward amid an uptick in inflation away from its long-term target of 2 percent. “I think they will do nothing, and I think they should do nothing,” Federal Reserve Bank of St Louis former president Jim Bullard said. “I think the
‘LASER-FOCUSED’: Trump pledged tariffs on specific sectors, including semiconductors, pharmaceuticals, steel, copper and aluminum, and perhaps even cars US President Donald Trump said he wants to enact across-the-board tariffs that are “much bigger” than 2.5 percent, the latest in a string of signals that he is preparing widespread levies to reshape US supply chains. “I have it in my mind what it’s going to be but I won’t be setting it yet, but it’ll be enough to protect our country,” Trump told reporters on Monday night. Asked about a report that incoming US Secretary of the Treasury Scott Bessent favored starting with a global rate of 2.5 percent, Trump said he did not think Bessent supported that and would not
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