U.S. fines GM for missing deadline

DETROIT (AP) ― A government safety agency is fining General Motors $7,000 a day, saying the company failed to fully respond to its requests for information about a faulty ignition switch by an April 3 deadline.The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said in a letter to GM on Tuesday that the company already owes $28,000 in fines, and they will accrue at $7,000 per day until it provides all the requested information.In February, the agency began investigating whether GM was slow to pro

April 9, 2014

Intel cuts 1,500 jobs in Costa Rica

SAN JOSE (AFP) ― U.S. microchip giant Intel announced Tuesday it was reducing its assembly and testing operations in Costa Rica and will lay off 1,500 employees.The move was a major blow to the economy of the Central American country, where 2,700 people were employed at an assembly plant set up in 1998.“We are going to phase our manufacturing operations in Costa Rica over the next six months. It is assembly test manufacturing. It will result in the loss of about 1,500 jobs,” Intel spokesman Chuc

April 9, 2014

U.S. banks forced to hold $68b in extra capital

WASHINGTON (AP) ― Regulators are acting to require U.S. banks to build a sturdier financial base to lessen the risk that they could collapse and cause a global meltdown. The eight biggest banks will have to meet stricter measures for holding capital ― money that provides a cushion against unexpected losses ― under a rule that regulators adopted Tuesday. The Federal Reserve, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. and the Treasury’s Office of the Comptroller of the Currency voted separately to requir

April 9, 2014

Valls vows tax cuts for firms, households

RIS (AP) ― France’s new prime minister, facing a confidence vote Tuesday, promised an economic turnaround built on plans to let corporations keep more profits, cut taxes for all households, and redraw a new, less bureaucratic map. Selling the proposals of a deeply unpopular president to his own Socialist lawmakers, Prime Minister Manuel Valls acknowledged that the Socialist defeat in recent elections showed a France of “too much suffering and not enough hope.” Valls went before the Socialist-led

April 9, 2014

World economy gains but faces threats

WASHINGTON (AP) ― The global economy is strengthening but faces threats from super-low inflation and outflows of capital from emerging economies, the International Monetary Fund warned Tuesday. The lending organization expects the global economy to grow 3.6 percent this year and 3.9 percent in 2015, up from 3 percent last year. Those figures are just one-tenth of a percentage point below the IMF’s previous forecasts in January. The acceleration is being driven mostly by strong growth in advanced

April 9, 2014

Humans stealing jobs from robots at Toyota

Inside Toyota Motor Corp.’s oldest plant, there’s a corner where humans have taken over from robots in thwacking glowing lumps of metal into crankshafts. This is Mitsuru Kawai’s vision of the future. “We need to become more solid and get back to basics, to sharpen our manual skills and further develop them,” said Kawai, a half century-long company veteran tapped by president Akio Toyoda to promote craftsmanship at Toyota’s plants. “When I was a novice, experienced masters used to be called gods,

April 8, 2014

China’s smog splits families as firms pay for fresh air

As a thick smog hung over Beijing last year, Stephanie Giambruno and her husband decided it was time for her and their two girls to return to the U.S. Giambruno’s husband stayed back in China for his job as general manager of a global technology company. He now skypes with the family twice a day and lives with “constant jet lag” as he travels to Florida once a month to see them, she says. While it’s hard to be apart, Giambruno says Beijing’s record air pollution left them no choice. She saw frie

April 8, 2014

Ford recalls nearly 435,000 vehicles

DETROIT (AP) ― Ford is recalling nearly 435,000 cars and SUVs in the U.S. and Canada to fix rusting frame parts or faulty seats.The biggest of the two recalls covers nearly 386,000 Ford Escapes from the 2001 through 2004 model years. Ford says the subframes can rust, allowing a control arm to separate and hamper steering control. Ford is aware of one crash but no injuries linked to the problem.The SUVs were originally sold or registered in 20 states and Washington, D.C., where salt is used to cl

April 8, 2014

BOJ refrains from boosting stimulus

The Bank of Japan refrained from adding extra stimulus as policy makers said the world’s third-biggest economy can maintain a recovery even with last week’s increase in the sales tax. Gov. Haruhiko Kuroda and his board kept a pledge to expand the monetary base at a pace of 60 trillion yen to 70 trillion yen ($681 billion) per year, the central bank said in a statement Tuesday in Tokyo, as forecast by all 36 economists in a Bloomberg News survey. The central bank will add more stimulus by July to

April 8, 2014

BOJ seen doubling ETF purchases in next round of easing

Japan’s central bank will probably double purchases of exchange-traded funds in a second round of monetary easing under Governor Haruhiko Kuroda anticipated in coming months, a Bloomberg News survey of economists shows. The Bank of Japan, which tomorrow is forecast to leave unchanged a 60 trillion yen to 70 trillion yen ($586 billion to $679 billion) target for yearly expansion of the monetary base, will increase annual ETF buys to 2 trillion yen in months ahead, according to a survey of 36 anal

April 7, 2014

Nigeria becomes Africa’s biggest economy

ABUJA (AFP) ― Nigeria on Sunday became Africa’s biggest economy, leap-frogging South Africa, after the government announced a long-overdue rebasing of the country’s gross domestic product.The new calculations take into account changes in production and consumption since the last time the exercise was carried out in 1990, including an added focus on communications and the movie industry.The data indicated that the economy grew to $453 billion in 2012, instead of $264 billion as measured by the Wo

April 7, 2014

IMF: U.S. job numbers fall short

International Monetary Fund Managing Director Christine Lagarde said the number of jobs created in the U.S. is “not at potential,” as regulatory and policy uncertainties deter some companies from hiring. In an interview with Fox News, Lagarde also urged the European Central Bank to address the euro region’s risk of low inflation and said Ukraine’s government must adopt some of the measures it has pledged to take before receiving IMF money. U.S. payrolls rose 192,000 in March, the Labor Departmen

April 6, 2014

‘Vigilant’ ASEAN braces for more Fed tapering

NAYPYIDAW, Myanmar (AFP) ― Southeast Asian finance ministers vowed vigilance Saturday in the face of economic risks such as capital outflows caused by the U.S. Federal Reserve’s “tapering” of its massive monetary stimulus.Officials said the 10-member Association of Southeast Asian Nations was well-placed to withstand the winding down of the U.S. quantitative easing program, at a meeting that underscored host Myanmar’s return to the international diplomatic stage.The region’s economic outlook “re

April 6, 2014

Amazon unveils Fire TV set top streaming device

NEW YORK (AP) ― Amazon is making a bid to enter living rooms with Amazon Fire TV, a new set-top box that allows streaming of online video, music and other content to televisions. The company says the $99 device has better speed, performance and search functions than other streaming boxes such as Apple TV and Google Chromecast. But Amazon is coming late to the streaming set-top game, and it remains to be seen whether the company is offering enough new and better services to lure customers away fr

April 3, 2014