HONG KONG

GDP may have fallen 1.4 percent in January: poll

The city's economy probably shrank 1.4 percent in the fourth quarter from a year earlier, sending it deeper into recession and pressuring the government to offer stimulus in its annual budget tomorrow, a Reuters poll shows.

The decline in gross domestic product (GDP) would be the first annual decline since the SARS outbreak battered the economy in the second quarter of 2003.

A few analysts who forecasted a quarterly change in the GDP in the fourth quarter expected the economy had shrunk 1.6 percent, seasonally adjusted, from the third quarter.

HK$ rises against the USD, partly due to stocks rally

The Hong Kong dollar nudged higher against the US dollar yesterday, partly bolstered by a rally in local stocks.

The local currency was up 0.01 percent at 7.7532 after climbing to 7.7526, its strongest level in a week. Dealers attributed the modest gains in part to a rise in equity markets.

One dealer at a European bank expected the USD/HKD spot rate to hover in a range of 7.7520 and 7.7540 in the next few days.

Coastal Greenland to buy less land than planned

Highly geared mainland property developer Coastal Greenland will cut its land-acquisition target in the next fiscal year by more than 80 percent because of weak market sentiment, and will review offer prices to speed up property sales, a senior executive said on Monday.

"We will speed up sales by offering our flats at competitive prices, in line with the market conditions," Chief Financial Officer Paul Cheng told Reuters in a telephone interview.

The company is expected to miss its sales target of 3 billion to 3.5 billion yuan for the current year ending in March, Cheng said.

TAIWAN

Financials drop to 3-month low on Fubon's 4.8% fall

Fubon Financial Holding fell to a three-month low, leading Taiwan's financial stocks lower after Deutsche Bank AG cut their price targets by as much as 18 percent, citing a negative outlook and lower earnings estimates.

Fubon, the second-largest listed financial-services company by value, sank as much as 4.8 percent to NT$18.70 yesterday in Taipei, set for its lowest close since Nov 21.

Fubon's 12-month share-price target was cut 5.3 percent to NT$27.19 in a Deutsche Bank report released yesterday.

DRAM makers lead shares in a 0.92 percent rise

Taipei stocks finished 0.92 percent higher yesterday, as DRAM makers such as Powerchip jumped on a report that the government will lay out a consolidation plan for the battered industry later this week.

The main TAIEX share index closed up 40.84 points at 4,477.78. Turnover was light at NT$57.4 billion, lower than NT$60 billion in the previous session.

The market tracked Wall Street lower at the open but reversed course after half an hour of trade, analysts said.

Technical glitch forces FPC to shut down naphtha unit

Formosa Petrochemical Corp (FPC) has started shutting down its No 3 naphtha unit due to a technical glitch, industry sources said yesterday, adding that the outage was likely to last for two weeks.

In line with the shutdown, the petrochemical firm plans to restart No 1 naphtha unit a couple of days earlier than expected, the sources close to regional naphtha cracker operations said.

A regional trader said that because of the unexpected outage, Formosa's smaller No 1 unit will resume operations a bit earlier, but it can hardly cover the capacity of the No 3 unit.

Agencies

(HK Edition 02/24/2009 page16)