Property tax hikes in Singapore may spark investors’ interest in business real estate
Business real estate in Singapore may attract investor interest as it will not be subject to additional buyer stamp duty, CBRE’s Henry Chin said.
CBRE is “very positive” about offices, retail stores, hotels and especially shops, Chin told CNBC’s “Squawk Box Asia”.
While the mass housing market is prone to remain resilient and stable, Chin said Singapore’s newly raised property taxes would have a “profound impact” on speculative luxury housing developments. Stamp duty for foreign home buyers has doubled from 30% to 60% since Thursday.
“We imagine that in 2023 the value of housing transactions will fall by 10%,” he added.
In Hong Kong, business real estate is looking “increasingly attractive” to recent investors as rents have fallen, Chin said. Nonetheless, he said Singapore continues to be a “safer selection” for risk-averse investors as it provides a gentle flow of income.
— Audrey Wan
Bank of Japan keeps rates of interest negative, makes no changes to yield curve control
Bank of Japan left rates of interest unchanged during the first political meeting of newly appointed governor Kazuo Ueda.
The choice was in step with economists’ expectations of no change in the benchmark rate of interest, which has remained at minus 0.1% since the central bank cut rates below zero in 2016.
The Japanese yen weakened further to 134.6 against the US dollar and yields 10-year Japanese government bonds was 0.460%.
Ueda stressed earlier this week that inflation must be “fairly strong and near 2%” – the central bank’s goal – before making any adjustments to its yield curve control policy.
— Jihye Lee
Top Chinese chip maker SMIC will ‘fight’ for competitive production of cutting-edge chips: analysts
China’s top chip maker SMIC is not going to find a way to provide cutting-edge chips without access to high-tech machinery, CNBC analysts have told CNBC.
SMIC, or Semiconductor Manufacturing International Co., was unable to acquire extreme ultraviolet (EUV) lithography machines, which are crucial for large-scale production of advanced chips at lower cost.
EUV machines can only be produced by one company in the world, namely a Dutch company ASML.
“Producing these chips using less advanced equipment is just unprofitable for SMIC,” said Phelix Lee, an equity analyst at Morningstar Asia.
Dutch regulations stipulate that ASML could have to use for a license to export its EUV machines. ASML has not yet shipped these advanced machines to China.
Read the full story here.
— Sheila Chiang
Private house prices in Singapore are rising at a faster rate of three.3% in the first quarter
Private house prices in Singapore increased by 3.3% in the first quarter of 2023, faster than the 0.4% increase recorded in the previous quarter.
Singapore Urban Redevelopment Authority revealed it land property prices increased by 5.9%, while non-terrestrial property prices increased by 2.6% in the first quarter of 2023.
This compares with a rise of 0.6% for land, as well as a 0.3% increase for non-land properties in the previous quarter.
Individually, rents increased by 7.2%, barely less in comparison with the increase of seven.4% in the previous quarter.
It comes after surprise cooling measures introduced by Singapore late on Wednesday, when the country raised taxes on property purchases amid fears that rising prices “could overtake economic fundamentals”.
– Lim Hui Jie
The Nikkei reports that the Bank of Japan has began discussions on changing its forward guidance
Bank of Japan officials have begun planning a “broad policy review”, including discussions on revising its forecast, Nike reported.
The report added that while talks include postponing a choice on the YCC amendments, there’s the possibility of a follow-up that may take a couple of yr after the review.
The Nikkei also reported that the central bank is moving towards a revision of its guidelines to remove the reference to monitoring the effects of Covid and will discuss dropping language about its readiness for further easing if essential.
— Jihye Lee
For the first time since 2020, the ANA scores for the full yr are black
Japanese carrier All Nippon Airways posted a full-year net profit of 89.5 billion yen ($668 million) for the 2022 fiscal yr ended March, its first full profit since 2020.
This was a reversal of the lack of 143.6 billion yen in the previous financial yr and higher than the net profit in 2019, which was 28 billion yen.
Operating profit was 120 billion yen, in comparison with an operating lack of 173.1 billion yen in the previous yr. Revenue was 1.7 trillion yen, up 67% year-on-year.
in releaseThe ANA said the airline industry was “improving rapidly”, adding that each domestic and international flights had benefited from the easing of Covid-19 restrictions.
CNBC Pro: Shares of this slimming drug maker are up 20% this yr – and Barclays sees it rising
The pharmaceutical stock behind the popular weight-loss drug is up 137% since the drug was approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration.
Investment bank Barclays expects its share value to proceed to rise as the marketplace for obesity drugs could exceed $100 billion, in accordance with Barclays.
CNBC Pro subscribers can read more here.
— Ganesh Rao
CNBC Pro: Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley say these chip stocks have more upside potential – giving one nearly 50%
Chip stocks have rebounded this yr after a poor performance in 2022.
The PHLX Semiconductor Sector Index is up nearly 17% year-to-date, making the sector considered one of the vivid spots in the market turmoil.
CNBC Pro takes a have a look at semiconductor stocks that banks are giving further profits.
CNBC Pro subscribers can read more here.
— Weizhen Tan
The unemployment rate in Japan rises to 2.8%, industrial production is growing
Japan’s unemployment rate rose to 2.8% in March from 2.6% in February, government data showed.
The reading was higher than Reuters’ forecast of two.5%, the highest reading since January 2022. The job-to-applicant ratio in the country was 1.32, below Reuters’ forecast of 1.34.
Meanwhile, industrial production rose 0.8% month-on-month in March after rising 4.6% in the previous month. This exceeds Reuters forecast of a 0.5% increase over the month.
On an annualized basis, the reading fell by 0.8% in March after falling by 1.4% in February.
The March reading was driven by automobiles, semiconductors and flat-panel equipment, while declines were seen in memory chips and lively LCD panels.
— Jihye Lee
South Korea reported a smaller-than-expected decline in industrial production in March
South Korea’s industrial production was approx a decrease of seven.6%. year-on-year, a smaller decline in comparison with economists’ expectations of 10.1%.
It is usually the second month in a row that industrial production has increased, after falling 13.4% in January and falling 8% in February.
On a month-on-month basis, industrial production rose by 5.1%, a reversal of a 2.7% fall in February.
– Lim Hui Jie
Inflation in Tokyo exceeds expectations, above the central bank’s goal
The buyer price index in the Japanese capital rose 3.5% in April, government data showed on Friday.
The reading exceeded forecasts in a Reuters poll, which expected a 3.2% rise over the month, after posting a rather lower inflation reading of three.2% in March.
Excluding fresh food, the Tokyo consumer price index rose 3.5 percent. — also above the central bank’s inflation goal of two%.
The Japanese yen stood at 133.83 against the dollar shortly after publication. The ten-year Japanese government bond yield was 0.476%, approaching the upper end of the central bank’s tolerance band of fifty basis points above and below 0%.
The US economy is growing slower than expected in the first quarter
The US economy grew 1.1% in the first quarter, much slower than expected, the Commerce Department said. Based on Dow Jones, economists had forecast growth of two%. The report showed stronger inflation with prices rising by 4%, in comparison with the estimate of three.7%.
—Jeff Cox
The communications services sector was approaching its best day since February
Communications shares hit their best day since February 2, with the sector holding around 5.8%. goal brought profits in the sector after the release of first-quarter results that beat analysts’ expectations. Tech stocks are up greater than 15% recently.
— Sarah Min
First Republic stocks stabilize
Shares of a besieged regional bank First Republic rose on Thursday, giving a respite after two days of intense sales.
The stock was up 71 cents, or about 12%, but still trading below $7 a share.
First Republic shares closed at $16 a share on Monday before the bank released its first-quarter results, which showed deposits shrunk by about 40% in the first three months of the yr.
The First Republic and its advisers are attempting to persuade other banks to purchase a few of its assets at above-market rates to permit the First Republic to reshape its balance sheet, CNBC reported Wednesday.
First Republic
Analysts update goal prices on Meta after better-than-expected earnings
Facebook’s parent company goal better-than-expected quarterly results encouraged analysts to stay optimistic.
Corporations including Goldman Sachs, JPMorgan Chase and Citigroup all updated their stock price targets.
“Developing more open source models (including LLM) and helping to create an open ecosystem is one other area of focus as the open ecosystem should enable META to remain ahead and increase infrastructure performance over time,” Brian Nowak of Morgan Stanley wrote on Thursday.
Meta beat Wall Street’s estimates of each adjusted earnings per share and revenue on Wednesday, despite concerns about slower ad sales. After the results, shares gained as much as 12%.
“Metaearnings demonstrates the company’s commitment to cost discipline while accelerating NT’s revenue growth as well as continuing to take a position in long-term transformative technologies such as AI and the metaverse,” said JPMorgan analyst Doug Anmuth.
Read the full story here.
— Brian Evans