theSun | FRIDAY MAY 15 2009 15

business KLCI
STI
1,011.99
2,122.11
10.85
63.18
Nikkei
TSEC
9,093.73
6,364.17
246.76
120.97
Hang Seng 16,541.69 517.93 KOSPI 1,380.95 33.57
SCI 2,639.89 23.88 S&P/ASX200 3,723.40 132.70

KL market summary MAY 14, 2009

INDICES CHANGE
Share prices end lower as investors cash out FBMEMAS 6,757.92 -79.36
SHARE prices on Bursa Ma- moved between 1,019.10 consolidation after the recent COMPOSITE 1,011.99 -10.85
laysia closed lower yesterday, and 1,012.00 throughout the run-up. INDUSTRIAL 2,242.96 -8.41
extending their downtrend as day, with losses were driven Losers outnumbered gain- CONSUMER PRODUCT 304.06 -3.33
investors continued to cash mostly by finance-related ers by 558 to 141 while 201 INDUSTRIAL PRODUCT 79.79 -1.33
out amid Wall Street’s weaker stocks. counters were unchanged, CONSTRUCTION 195.45 -4.04
TRADING SERVICES 134.35 -1.41
performance overnight, deal- “Finance counters were 363 untraded and 55 others FINANCE 7,995.21 -73.40
ers said. not be favourable as most suspended. PROPERTIES 685.41 -11.61
The dealers said the Wall investors stayed on the side- Of the heavyweights, PLANTATIONS 5,080.26 -57.14
Street downtrend, attributed lines, awaiting the announce- Sime Darby advanced five MINING 291.81 -4.05
to gloomy US retail sales re- ments of major companies’ sen to RM6.55 and Maybank FBMSHA 7,055.81 -80.65
port, dampened Asian stocks, financial results,” one of the rose two sen to RM4.98 FBM2BRD 4,655.21 -78.04
resulting in mounting doubt dealers said. while Bumiputra-Commerce TECHNOLOGY 14.68 -0.46
over immediate recovery. Phua Kwee Hock, techni- decreased 10 sen to RM8.85 TURNOVER VALUE
The KLCI, which has been on cal analyst at SJ Securities, and Tenaga Nasional was flat
a downtrend since Monday, said the market saw some at RM7.25. – Bernama 2,6926bil RM1.8946bil
briefs
Sanyo reports US$976mil loss
TOKYO: Japan’s Sanyo Electric Co yesterday reported

US currency bill tempts

a net loss of US$976 million (RM3.4 billion) for the past
financial year due to falling sales and restructuring costs
but said it expects to break even this year.
Sanyo, which is being bought by its bigger rival Pana-
sonic Corp, said net losses reached ¥93.23 billion (RM3.13
billion) in the 12 months to March, reversing the previous
year’s profit of ¥28.7 billion (RM964 million)

protectionism: China
It was the first time in two years the Osaka-based
electronics maker had fallen into the red.
Operating profit tumbled 89.1% to ¥8.28 billion (RM278
million) as sales fell 12.2% to ¥1.77 trillion (59.5 billion)
amid the global recession. – AFP

Mitsui official gets 5 months jail

BEIJING: China rejected claims it
has manipulated yuan exchange rate
policies to tilt trade flows against the
United States, saying yesterday that
proposed legislation before the US
Congress could stoke protectionism.
Chinese Foreign Ministry spokes-
man Ma Zhaoxu made the statement
in response to Congressional moves
to curb China’s exports unless Beijing
realigns its exchange rate to make
those exports more costly, which
would help narrow the two countries’
trade gap.
The legislation would require the
government to impose anti-dumping
and countervailing duties on imports
from a country whose currency has
been “misaligned” for a long time.
The Chinese Foreign Ministry has
no direct say in trade and currency
Asia stocks drop, US retail
sales dent rally
policy, and usually confines itself to
general statements. Spokesman Ma
stayed to that course.
“The Chinese government has nev-
er engaged in so-called manipulation
of currency exchange rates to obtain
international trade benefits,” Ma told
a regular news conference.
“Making groundless accusations
over exchange rates will only encour-
age US trade protectionism, and this
would be of no help in really resolving
the problems.”
The bill appears to have slim chance
of becoming law anytime soon.
Senator Debbie Stabenow, one of
the legislators who introduced the bill
on Wednesday, said it was uncertain
when or how the legislation would
advance since she had no commit-
ments from Senate leaders to move it
forward.
US lawmakers have complained
that China has manipulated its cur-
rency, but President Barack Obama’s
Treasury Department declined to
formally label China as a currency
manipulator.
Previous efforts to pass similar
legislation have failed.
The US trade deficit with China
widened to a record US$266.3 billion
(RM920 billion) in 2008. But the gap
has narrowed slightly in the first three
months of 2009, as weaker demand
amid a recession has cut China’s
exports to the United States by nearly
11 percent.
US Treasury Secretary Timothy
Geithner will visit Beijing early next
month for two days of meetings with
top Chinese officials. – Reuters
SINGAPORE: The supervisor of a former Mitsui oil
trader convicted of concealing US$81 million (RM284
million) of losses from bad trading bets was sen-
Rising tenced to five months jail in Singapore yesterday for
abetting the scam.
talent Mitsui & Co, Japan’s second-biggest trading house,
pg 17 shut Mitsui Oil Asia (MOA) after the Singapore office
raked up the losses in naphtha trading up until Nov
17, 2006.
Takayoshi Wada had pleaded guilty to three charg-
es of helping his then-colleague, Noriyuki Yamazaki,
in making false entries in the accounts of MOA. Wada
had faced up to seven years’ jail as well as fines of up
to S$10,000 (RM24,2000).
Yamazaki was sentenced in February to five years
in jail. – Reuters
SIA Q4 net profit plunges 92%
SINGAPORE: Singapore Airlines (SIA) said Thursday fourth
quarter net profit dived 92% on year to S$41.9 million
(RM100 million) as the global slump hit passenger and
cargo demand.
Net profit tumbled by US$486 million (RM1.7 billion),
SIA said in a statement, as revenue fell 19.1% to US$3.32
billion (RM11.6 billion).
The carrier said “the decline in passenger and cargo
carriage accelerated in the fourth quarter.” – AFP

HONGKONG: Asian stocks fell
yesterday as weak US retail
sales underscored the long road
to economic recovery, prompt-
ing investors to take profits
on winning bets in equities,
higher-yielding currencies and
commodities over the past two
months.
The retreat in Asian shares
tracked an overnight drop on
Wall Street after retail sales
unexpectedly fell in April, sug-
gesting that consumers were still
struggling from job losses, falling
home prices and tighter credit.
Futures on Britain’s FTSE
100 were up 0.5% in early trade,
while futures on Germany’s DAX
were little changed.
“US retail sales point to a
continued slump in the world’s
largest economy,” said Y.S. Rhoo,
a market analyst at Hyundai
Securities in Seoul.
The dollar edged up from a
four-month low hit the previous
day as investors had gradu-
ally shifted funds away from the
safe-haven US currency and into
riskier assets. Oil prices pulled
further away from a six-month
peak reached this week.
Analysts said markets were
likely seizing on the poor US data
to take profits on positions that
were made on hopes that global
growth was slowly picking up.
That optimism drove up Asian
shares more than 50% at one
point from their low mark in
early March.
Ratings agency Standard &
Poor’s said in a report on Asian
economies yesterday that it
was too early to say the global
economy has bottomed.
The MSCI index of Asia-Pacific
shares outside Japan dropped
3.3% and looked poised for
its biggest one-day drop in six
weeks. But the benchmark was
still up some 19% since the start
of the year and 45% from its year
low struck in March.
On Wednesday, the S&P
500 shed 2.7%, and futures on
that US stock index were down
slightly in Asia.
Japan’s Nikkei average fell
2.6%. Hongkong’s Hang Seng
index shed 3.2%, with HSBC
and China Mobile – the two big-
gest heavyweights in the index
– leading the decline.
In another sign that investors
were taking profits, open inter-
est in Hang Seng futures fell on
Wednesday after reaching its
highest level since Oct 8 – at
the tail end of last year’s slide to
five-year lows.
The dip in open interest and
fall-off in volume signalled that
market players were taking chips
off the table and were reluctant
to chase the market higher.
“Even though money is con-
tinuing to come into Hongkong,
it is not directly flowing into the
stock market anymore,” said
Linus Yip, strategist with First
Shanghai Securities in Hongkong.
– Reuters
REUTERSPIX
15,000 jobs off the line ...
A PEDESTRIAN speaks on a mobile phone near the British Telecoms
Tower in central London. British telecoms operator BT said yesterday
it will axe up to 15,000 more jobs after posting a net loss of £83 million
(RM440 million) for its 2008-2009 year. The heavy job cuts, outlined in an
annual results statement, amount to 10% of BT’s workforce and follow
major problems at the company’s struggling Global Services division. The
group plunged into the red after a “challenging” year amid a spreading
global economic downturn. It had enjoyed net profit of £1.737 billion
(RM9.2 billion) in the previous 2007-2008 year.
Sony posts first loss in 14 years
TOKYO: Sony Corp announced yesterday its first
annual loss in 14 years and warned it would stay in
the red this year as the recession cuts demand for
televisions, cameras and other electronics.
The Japanese giant posted a net loss of ¥98.94
billion (RM3.5 billion) for the year to March, a dra-
matic turnaround from the previous year’s profit of
¥369.44 billion (RM12.4 billion) The maker of Bravia
televisions, PlayStation game consoles and Walkman
music players logged an operating loss of ¥227.78
billion (RM7.6 billion), against a year-earlier profit of
¥475.30 billion (RM15.9 billion), as revenue tumbled
12.9%.
Sony said it was impacted by the weak economy, a
stronger yen and the falling value of its investments.
But the net loss was smaller than its forecast for a
150-billion-yen shortfall.
“The business environment has been extremely
severe,” Sony’s chief financial officer, Nobuyuki
Oneda, told reporters. – AFP
Deflation worsens in Ireland
DUBLIN: Retail prices in recession-hit Ireland slumped
3.5% in April on a 12-month basis, official data showed
yesterday, as the eurozone nation was plagued by its
worst deflation since the 1930s.
“The last time the Consumer Price Index was this low
was in the second quarter of 1933 when it was minus
6.9%,” a Central Statistics Office (CSO) spokesman said.
Ireland, the first eurozone member to fall into recession
as a result of the global financial crisis, has suffered a
run of falling prices, or deflation, on weak consumer
demand.
“Consumer Prices in April, as measured by the
Consumer Prices Index, decreased by 0.8% in the month.
This compares to an increase of 0.1% recorded in April of
last year,” the CSO said in a statement.
“As a result, prices on average, as measured by the
CPI, were 3.5% lower in April compared with April 2008.”
– AFP