Rounding up top investing articles from around the web, including articles shared on Twitter.
Fed slashes interest rates by a half point, an aggressive start to its first easing campaign in four years (CNBC)
- The Federal Open Market Committee chose to lower its key overnight borrowing rate by a half percentage point, or 50 basis points, amid signs that inflation was moderating and the labor market was weakening.
- It was the first interest rate cut since the early days of the Covid pandemic.
- “The Committee has gained greater confidence that inflation is moving sustainably toward 2 percent, and judges that the risks to achieving its employment and inflation goals are roughly in balance,” the Federal Reserve statement said.
Ray Dalio says the Fed has a tough balancing act as the economy faces ‘enormous amount of debt’ (CNBC)
- As the U.S. Federal Reserve implemented its first interest rate cut since the early Covid pandemic, billionaire investor Ray Dalio flagged that the U.S. economy still faces an “enormous amount of debt.”
- “The challenge of the Federal Reserve is to keep interest rates high enough that they’re good for the creditor, while keeping them not so high that they’re problematic for the debtor,” the founder of Bridgewater Associates told CNBC’s “Squawk Box Asia.”
Depression, anxiety, stress: 1 in 3 youth in S’pore has had very poor mental health, says IMH survey (Straits Times)
A significant proportion of youth in Singapore have experienced severe or very severe symptoms of depression, anxiety or stress, the first nationwide survey on youth mental health by the Institute of Mental Health (IMH) found.
Nearly a third of young people aged 15 to 35 reported symptoms that included feeling empty, tense or upset most of the time, according to the National Youth Mental Health Study.
Hong Kong probe finds Cathay Airbus defect could cause ‘extensive’ damage (CNA)
The engine defect in the Airbus A350 plane that led to the cancellation of dozens of Cathay Pacific flights in early September could have escalated into “extensive damage”, according to a Hong Kong probe released on Thursday (Sep 19).
Hong Kong-based Cathay Pacific briefly grounded its fleet of A350s for inspections and repairs after a Zurich-bound plane was forced to turn back to Hong Kong on Sep 2.
The inspection found that components on 15 of the 48-plane fleet of A350s, powered by engines from the British manufacturer Rolls-Royce, had to be replaced.
Japan walkie-talkie maker Icom says it no longer makes radio reportedly used in Lebanon blasts (CNA)
apanese firm Icom said on Thursday (Sep 19) that it had stopped producing the model of radios reportedly used in recent blasts in Lebanon around 10 years ago.
“The IC-V82 is a handheld radio that was produced and exported, including to the Middle East, from 2004 to October 2014. It was discontinued about 10 years ago, and since then, it has not been shipped from our company,” Icom said in a statement.
Britain is back and ‘open for business’, says trade policy minister on boosting economic ties (CNA)
Southeast Asia is among the key engines of global growth in the years to come and poses “a huge commercial market”, said British Trade Policy Minister Douglas Alexander.
The region has a population of about 680 million people and an estimated total gross domestic product amounting to approximately US$3.6 trillion.
“There are real opportunities, both for investments into the United Kingdom and exports from the UK to this global growth pool,” said Mr Alexander, who is currently in Laos to attend the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) Economic Ministers’ Meeting.
“We are here with a very straightforward and open message: Britain is back and we’re open for business,” he told CNA on Wednesday (Sep 18).
Musk’s X skirts Brazil ban and returns to some users with change to server access (CNBC)
Some Brazilian users reconnected with X on Wednesday despite the Supreme Court’s recent nationwide ban, the result of the social network apparently changing the way its servers are accessed. The reunion may be short-lived, however.
Justice Alexandre de Moraes ordered X blocked nationwide on Aug. 30 after months of tension with billionaire Elon Musk surrounding orders to take down accounts and the limits of free speech in Brazil. He also established fines on anyone using virtual private networks (VPN) to access the platform.
That rendered X effectively inaccessible in the country until Wednesday, with AP journalists among those who had access. Experts examining X’s IP addresses said there are indications that the company has begun routing users through the servers of Cloudflare, a content delivery network, en route to its own.
China would love a domestic Nvidia rival — but that’s proving quite the challenge (CNBC)
- Chinese companies are ramping up efforts to produce a viable alternative to Nvidia’s chips that power artificial intelligence as Beijing continues its efforts to wean itself off American technology.
- But a number of roadblocks stand in China’s way from U.S. export restrictions that are hampering domestic semiconductor manufacturing to a lack of tech expertise.
- Analysts identified companies including Huawei as the key rivals to Nvidia in China.
Analog Devices, Tata Group in talks to make semiconductors in India (CNA)
Analog Devices (ADI) and Indian salt-to-aviation conglomerate Tata Group have signed a pact to explore making semiconductor products in India, the U.S. chipmaker said on Wednesday.
Tata Electronics, the electronics-manufacturing arm of the 156-year-old group, is investing a total of $14 billion to build India’s first semiconductor fabrication facility in Gujarat state and a chip-assembly and testing facility in the state of Assam.
Construction of the Tata Group’s semiconductor plant was greenlit by India earlier this year.
Japan, Hong Kong lead gains in Asia-Pacific markets as investors digest outsized Fed rate cut (CNBC)
- In lockstep with the Fed, the Hong Kong Monetary Authority cut its interest rate by 50 basis points to 5.25%, as the city’s currency is pegged to the greenback.
- The Bank of Japan has kicked off a two-day meeting ending Friday, where the central bankers will make a key rate decision, after it ended the decades-long ultralow interest rates earlier this year.
- New Zealand’s GDP for the second quarter contracted by 0.2% from the previous quarter, according to the official data released Thursday morning, less than Reuters poll estimates of a 0.4% decline.
Japan faces labor shortages and demographic crisis as elderly population hits record high (CNBC)
- Government data released ahead of Japan’s “Respect for the Aged Day” showed that the country’s population aged 65 and over had risen to an all-time high of 36.25 million.
- According to Robert Feldman, senior advisor at Morgan Stanley MUFG Securities, the data fuels concerns about demographic shifts and a labor crunch in the country.
CNA Explains: What is a Sumatra squall and how did it bring a sudden storm to Singapore? (CNA)
trong winds and heavy rain swept across Singapore on Tuesday night (Sep 17), toppling trees in various places.
The sudden storm was brought about by a Sumatra squall, the authorities and experts told CNA.
A squall is simply a sudden burst of strong winds that are accompanied by heavy rain. It is brief but intense, and it can die down as quickly as it started.
A Sumatra squall has characteristics that are specific to this region – it is a line of thunderstorms that develops over Indonesia’s Sumatra island or the Strait of Malacca, then moves eastwards to affect Singapore and Peninsula Malaysia.
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