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HONG KONG, China (AFP) — Asian stocks mostly opened the year with gains on Tuesday as traders drift back to work after the festive break, with Hong Kong the standout performer, though the dollar faced fresh pressure from most other currencies. Regional investors shrugged off dips in New York on the last day of 2017, instead building on the healthy advances fuelled by strong data, improving corporate profits and hopes Donald Trump’s tax cuts will […]
SINGAPORE, Singapore (AFP) — A Singapore bar that bills itself as the world’s highest cryptocurrency club is offering a New Year’s Eve package that includes a limousine pick-up and butler service — but it’ll cost you a whole bitcoin. Skyline, on the 45th floor of a skyscraper overlooking the city-state’s glittering waterfront, is promising partygoers a luxury-filled night out, with champagne and oysters and caviar. But it won’t come cheap, with the price of bitcoin […]
by John BIERS Agence France Presse NEW YORK, United States (AFP) — After a banner year for US stocks, that saw the Dow hitting repeated records, Wall Street strategists predicted 2018 would see more moderate gains and increased volatility as markets retreated in the final session of 2017 on Friday. A late sell-off pushed the market into the red amid declines in Apple, Amazon and some other high-flyers, but the decline didn’t put much of […]
TEHRAN, Iran (AFP) — Hundreds took to the streets of Iran’s second city Mashhad and other towns on Thursday to protest high prices and unemployment, a reformist media group reported. The protests were mostly directed at President Hassan Rouhani’s government, the Nazar media network reported. “The demonstration was illegal yet the police confronted them with a lot of tolerance,” Mashhad governor Mohammad Rahim Norouzian said, according to the semi-official ISNA news agency. Videos on Nazar’s […]
HONG KONG, China (AFP) — The dollar suffered fresh pressure on Friday as traders cash in the recent gains fueled by Donald Trump’s tax cuts, while Asian equities were on course to end a strong year in tepid fashion. Asia’s biggest markets have enjoyed huge gains over the past year — with Hong Kong up more than a third and Tokyo 20 percent higher — fuelled by expectations that Donald Trump would push through business-friendly […]
by Natsuko FUKUE Agence France Presse TOKYO, Japan (AFP) — Once asked on Twitter about his receding hairline, Masayoshi Son, founder of Japanese telecoms giant SoftBank, retorted: “My hair is not receding. I’m advancing.” It was a typically bullish remark from the 60-year-old tycoon, listed by Forbes as Japan’s richest man with an estimated fortune of $22.2 billion, who has embarked on a furious spree of purchases culminating in Thursday’s deal to take a hefty […]
by John BIERS Agence France Presse NEW YORK, United States (AFP) — The Dow drifted to a fresh record Thursday in sleepy holiday trading, while bitcoin prices tumbled after South Korea announced new restrictions on cryptocurrencies. Most of the 30 companies in the Dow Jones Industrial Average advanced in a quiet session, the latest record on the heels of dozens of earlier all-time highs in US equities this year. US stocks have been boosted all […]
SAN FRANCISCO, United States (AFP) — Apple on Thursday apologized to its customers for slowing down the performance of older iPhone models and said it would discount replacement batteries for some of its handsets. The move by Apple responded to an uproar from iPhone users — and a series of lawsuits — after news of the battery problems stoked concerns the company was unfairly nudging consumers to upgrade. “We know that some of you feel […]
PARIS, France (AFP) — Top Italian chef Massimo Bottura, whose Osteria Francescana was named the world’s best restaurant last year, is in talks to open a community kitchen in Paris that would serve the homeless and other people in need. “Discussions are underway to set up a canteen in the basement of the Madeleine Church,” Jean-Francois Rial, chief executive of the group Voyageurs du Monde, told AFP Thursday. “It is still just a project, nothing […]
by Anne LEC’HVIEN and Adam PLOWRIGHT Agence France-Presse PARIS, France (AFP) — French prosecutors have launched a probe into Japanese printer maker Epson for alleged planned obsolescence in its products, using landmark consumer legislation that campaigners hope to turn against Apple as well. The investigation, confirmed to AFP by a legal source on Thursday, was opened in November and is being led by anti-trust and consumer protection specialists in the French economy ministry under the […]
SAN FRANCISCO, California, United States (AFP) — Apple’s board has instructed chief executive Tim Cook to use only private aircraft “in the interests of security and efficiency” at the world’s most valuable company, regulatory documents show. A filing with securities regulators this week said the board determined that its CEO must use private aircraft for “all business and personal travel.” The policy was implemented in 2017 “in the interests of security and efficiency based on […]
TOKYO, Japan (AFP) — Nintendo is expecting to sell more than 20 million of its new “Switch” consoles in the next fiscal year, the firm’s president said, with sales outpacing its smash-hit Wii console in some places. Tatsumi Kimishima told Thursday’s Kyoto Shimbun newspaper that the momentum for Switch is stronger in some markets than that of the Wii, a smash-hit household console that sold more than 100 million units worldwide. Kimishima said he expected […]
