From Samira: To IL: A quick rundown on headline news on Asian Business - Saturday/Sunday
1. TOKYO: Japan shares lose momentum, HK recovers - Dollar holds firm against yen in Tokyo.
2. LONDON: Oil prices rise : Open considers more output cuts. Six Opec oil ministers have already publicly backed bigger output cuts if the 1.245 million bpd pledged in March by the cartel prove too puny to boost the ailing market.
UK oil firms keen to gain foothold in Iran - BP, Lasmo to set up offices in Tehran, joining Shell.
3. NEW YORK: US consumer confidence up - Highest in 30 years, but the Federal Reserve says trouble is bubbling in the economy.
4. MOSCOW: Russia discusses spending cuts - Government under pressure: Finance ministry proposed slashing spending in 1998 by 62.4 billion roubles ($10.8bn), almost double the 35 bn cuts Kiriyenko himself proposed last week.
5. KUWAIT: Kuwait Stock index regains 6.6% - Shares up 136.0 points; boosted by hopes the government planned to reform stock market and economic regulations.
6. OMAN: Tough lessons for Omani stocks - The market's two-year honeymoon of hefty gains (141% in 1997 and 26% in 1996) has been rudely interrupted by a liquidity shortage and a sick oil price. This year the booming Muscat Securities Market has fallen 15%.
7. US voices concern about Japan trade plus with the US which surged 11.2% in March from a year earlier to 300 bn yen.
8. HONG KONG: HK jobless rate jumps; crisis hits economy. Unemployment rate jumped to 3-1/2 year high of 3.5% for the first quarter of 1998, up 0.6% from December-February period.
9. GENEVA: Japanese premier pledges to put economy back on track, urges party unity. WTO chief urges governments to keep financial markets open. Asean labour ministers seek ways to ease unemployment.
10. MANILA: Banker warns speculators; call to defend peso. Singson, governor of Central Bank of the Philippines warned Thursday that monetary authorities would "take all necessary actions" to defend the peso, hit by speculative attacks this week.
11. SINGAPORE: SIA (Singapore Airlines Ltd) voted most admired firm company for the fourth year in a row followed by Japan's Sony Corp and Hewlett-Packard Co of the United States which got second and third place in the poll of 2,000 business executives across Asia.
12. BOMBAY: Indian central bank credit policy which cut the key bank rate by one percentage point disappoints industry; Market morale sags.
13. TOKYO: Japan's auto giants, Toyota Motor Corp and Nissan Motor Co Ltd., have halved the number of part-time workers since last year due to weak domestic sales. Also, Mitsubishi Electric Corp., Japan's third largest electric machinery maker, on Friday forecast a larger than expected loss (of 105 billion yen) for the year to March 1998 due to restructuring and a troubled affiliate.
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1. DUBAI: Iran backs more Opec output cuts.
2. DOHA: Qatar trade volume up; stocks ticked up in the week to Thursday which saw market capitalization rise nearly 9% when a new firm, Qatar Electricity and Water Co, was listed.
3. ABU DHABI: Financial turbulence to boost Asian exports to Gulf states. Gulf Arab states are expected to boost imports from Asia to take advantage of the plunging currencies in the region.
4. ABU DHABI: Gulf Arab oil producers will ask the United States to unblock nearly $75 million in frozen assets of a bank partly owned by Libya. The 6 GCC countries will make the demand on behalf of the Abu-Dhabi based Arab Bank for Investment and Foreign Trade (ARBIFT) at economic talks in Washington this month.
5. BEIJING: German conglomerate Siemens has become the first foreign manufacturer to win a license from China's central bank to set up an enterprise finance company.
6. WASHINGTON: S. Korea, IMF strike deal - Way cleared for loan payment. S. Korea has met the tough economic reform conditions set out by the IMF clearing the way for Seoul to get its next loan payment under a nearly $60 million rescue package.
7. GENEVA: Asians agree to launch economic surveillance scheme; ADB (Asian Development Banks) to tap capital markets amid cash crunch. ADB will be in "close coordination" with the IMF and World Bank in order to avoid a "wasteful duplication of functions" in the plan, formally called the Asean Economic Monitoring Mechanism. Japan's influential Vice Minister for International Finance, Sakakibara, held a special meeting with ASEAN ministers and South Korea on Thursday evening to brief them on Tokyo's 16-trillion-yen ($127 bn) package to resuscitate its economy.
The ADB said Friday it expects to float bonds in the future to tap the region's high saving rate and ease the credit crunch resulting from the financial crisis.
ADB President Mitsuo Sato said the bank was expected to consider a $1.5 billion assistance to Indonesia by 15 May as part of the $3.5 billion it had pledged over the next 3 years. The bank has contributed $300 million to Thailand where the contagion began in July 1997. Bank lending was expected to return to the normal level of between five billion and six billion dollars by 1999 as crisis-ravaged nations begin the recovery process.
8. JAKARTA: Suharto backs reforms: Policy guidelines to stay. Indonesia's President Suharto is not against reforms but any political or economic changes would take years to prepare if started now, two Cabinet ministers, Dahlan (Information Minister) and Hartono (Home Minister) said Saturday.
9. HONG KONG: HK to fight copyright pirates; tougher steps planned, including confiscation of the assets of those convicted of such crimes, closure order on premises including shops and factories which have been engaged in intellectual property rights piracy-related business.
10. BRUSSELS: Dutchman Wim Duisenberg looked close Saturday to be named as the first president of the European Central Bank, making him one of the most powerful men in international finance. Despite France's objections, 62-year old Duisenberg's qualities have earned him the support and trust of most of the EU nations, international financiers and stock markets who regard him as a guarantor of strict fiscal policy and a safeguard to the independence of the ECB.
11. TOKYO: Bank of Japan executive director Takayuki Kamoshida, who headed a probe into corruption at the central bank, committed suicide on Saturday.
12. WASHINGTON: Computer makers support Microsoft: Launch of Windows '98: Microsoft has rallied support from top executives at 26 computer manufacturers, who have signed and sent a letter to the Justice Department urging it not to block the scheduled launch of Windows 98. The government has taken Microsoft to court on grounds that its market practices connected with hits current operating system, Windows 95, violates a 1995 agreement with the Justice Department. Microsoft has appealed a federal court order issued last December that requires it to market Windows 95 separately from its Internet browser Explorer. |
