IN BRIEF (Page 16)

Goldman payouts

Goldman Sachs Group Inc, the most profitable securities firm in Wall Street history, awarded $67.5 million each to Co-Presidents Gary Cohn and Jon Winkelried, boosting their pay 27 percent from the prior year as the company evaded the mortgage losses spreading through the economy.

Cohn and Winkelried received 40 percent of their compensation in cash and 60 percent in restricted stock and options, New York-based Goldman said in a proxy filing with the US Securities and Exchange Commission.

Firm fined

Motorola Inc's South Korean unit was fined 696 million won ($727,000) by the nation's antitrust regulator, which cited unfair bidding practices.

Motorola colluded with its three South Korean sales agencies on the price and winner for bids on 15 contracts to supply radio systems, the Fair Trade Commission said in an e-mailed statement yesterday.

Freight forwarder dips

Kuehne & Nagel International AG, a Swiss sea-freight forwarder, said fourth-quarter profit fell 15 percent as tax expenses increased.

Net income declined to 123.2 million Swiss francs ($120.8 million), or 1.05 francs a share, from 144.1 million francs, or 1.22 francs, a year earlier, the Schindellegi, Switzerland-based company said yesterday in an e-mailed statement. Sales advanced 14 percent to 5.6 billion francs.

Indians join race

India's Mahindra & Mahindra Ltd, the Hinduja Group and Bharat Forge Ltd have joined the race to buy the forging unit of ThyssenKrupp AG, Germany's largest steelmaker, the Business Standard reported.

The deal is estimated at more than $1 billion, the newspaper said, citing unidentified investment bankers. ThyssenKrupp denied that the companies are in the fray to buy its unit, while the Hinduja Group said it has started talks with investment bankers for the purchase, the newspaper reported.

Target unchanged

South Korea's finance ministry said yesterday it was maintaining its 2008 economic growth target of around 6 percent, due to deregulation and tax cuts, despite a slowing global economy.

Economic growth in 2007 was 4.9 percent. Asia's fourth-largest economy is expected to be capable of 7 percent growth and have a stable current account and prices in five years, the Ministry of Strategy and Finance said.

Takeover in pipeline

Private equity group JC Flowers is gearing up to launch a 3.5 billion pound offer for UK life insurer Friends Provident which could come as early as next week, the Sunday Express reported.

The private equity group is said to be waiting for Friends to unveiled its annual results today before showing its hand, the paper added.

Report denied

Sony Ericsson, a joint venture between Sony Corp and Ericsson, said it would continue developing cellphones for NTT DoCoMo Inc, denying a newspaper report that it plans to substantially scale back its mobile business with Japan's top wireless operator.

The Nikkei business daily said Sony had decided to stop cellphone development and production for DoCoMo, and that it would instead procure handsets from other mobile phone makers and supply them to DoCoMo under the Sony Ericsson brand.

Gas plans

US oil major Chevron Corp plans to develop two multi-billion dollar gas projects in Asia, amid forecasts of surging gas demand and rising prices.

The second-largest US oil and gas company said it has approved the $3 billion Platong Gas 2 project in Thailand and also plans to develop a new liquefied natural gas project using gas from its wholly-owned Wheatstone discovery off northwest Australia.

Agencies

(China Daily 03/11/2008 page16)