Latest from Business Times
Business Times
2 hours ago
- Business
- Business Times
Flood-hit China expands social security net as extreme rain takes toll
[BEIJING] China has expanded the economic safeguards for segments of its population affected by flood control schemes in times of extreme rainfall, including pledges of direct compensation from the central government and payments for livestock losses. In China, diverting flood-waters to areas next to rivers is a major step in managing downstream flooding. As extreme rainfall grows in frequency, China is increasingly utilising such areas, some of which have been unused until now and have been populated by farms, croplands and even residential buildings, stoking social tensions. According to revised rules on compensation related to flood diversions released late on Friday (Jun 27), the central government will now bear 70 per cent of all compensation funds, with local governments responsible for the rest. Previously, the ratio was to be decided based on actual economic losses and the fiscal situation of local governments. Livestock and poultry that cannot be relocated in time before the arrival of diverted flood-waters will also be included in the compensation scheme for the first time. Previously, only the loss of working animals could be claimed for compensation. In the summer of 2023, almost one million people in Hebei, a province on the doorstep of Beijing, were relocated after record rain forced authorities to divert water from swollen rivers to some populated areas for storage, triggering anger over the homes and farms sacrificed to save the Chinese capital. China currently has 98 designated flood diversion areas spanning major river basins including the Yangtze River basin, home to a third of the country's population. During the 2023 Hebei floods, eight flood storage areas were used. A NEWSLETTER FOR YOU Friday, 2 pm Lifestyle Our picks of the latest dining, travel and leisure options to treat yourself. Sign Up Sign Up Since the start of the East Asia monsoon in early June, precipitation in the middle and lower reaches of the Yangtze has been up to two times higher than usual, officials from the China Meterological Administration told reporters on Friday. In other parts of China, daily rainfall measured by 30 meteorological stations in provinces such as Hubei and Guizhou broke records for the month of June, they said. Guizhou was the focal point of China's flood alleviation efforts this week, with one of its cities hit by flooding on a scale that meteorologists said could only happen once in 50 years, and at a speed that shocked its 300,000 residents. That prompted Beijing to issue pledges on Thursday to move vulnerable populations and industries to low-flood areas and allocate more space for flood diversion. REUTERS
Business Times
3 hours ago
- Business
- Business Times
Warren Buffett donates record US$6 billion Berkshire shares
[NEW YORK] Warren Buffett donated on Friday (Jun 27) another US$6 billion of Berkshire Hathaway stock to the Gates Foundation and four family charities, his biggest annual donation since he began giving away his fortune nearly two decades ago. The donation of about 12.36 million Berkshire Class B shares boosted Buffett's overall giving to the charities to well over US$60 billion. He donated 9.43 million shares to the Gates Foundation; 943,384 shares to the Susan Thompson Buffett Foundation; and 660,366 shares to each of three charities led respectively by his children Howard, Susie and Peter: the Howard G. Buffett Foundation, Sherwood Foundation and NoVo Foundation. Warren Buffett still owns 13.8 per cent of Berkshire's stock, based on reported shares outstanding. His US$152 billion net worth prior to Friday's donations made him the world's fifth-richest person, according to Forbes magazine. Buffett would rank sixth after the donations, which surpassed the US$5.3 billion he donated last June. He donated another US$1.14 billion to the family charities last November. A NEWSLETTER FOR YOU Friday, 2 pm Lifestyle Our picks of the latest dining, travel and leisure options to treat yourself. Sign Up Sign Up In a statement, Buffett maintained he does not intend to sell any Berkshire shares. Now 94, Buffett began giving away his fortune in 2006. He changed his will last year, designating 99.5 per cent of his remaining fortune after his death to a charitable trust overseen by his children. They will have about a decade to distribute the money, and must decide where it goes unanimously. Susie Buffett is 71, Howard Buffett is 70, and Peter Buffett is 67. Warren Buffett has led Omaha, Nebraska-based Berkshire since 1965. The US$1.05 trillion conglomerate owns close to 200 businesses including Geico car insurance and the BNSF railroad, and dozens of stocks including Apple and American Express. Susie Buffett leads the Susan Thompson Buffett Foundation, which funds reproductive health and is named for her mother, who was Warren Buffett's first wife. The Sherwood Foundation supports Nebraska non-profits and early childhood education. The Howard G. Buffett Foundation focuses on global hunger, combating human trafficking and mitigating conflicts. The NoVo Foundation has initiatives focused on marginalised girls and women, and on indigenous communities. Buffett said last June that donations to the Gates Foundation would end when he dies. REUTERS
Business Times
3 hours ago
- Business
- Business Times
Hong Kong-listed China Medical System seeks secondary listing on SGX
[SINGAPORE] Hong Kong-listed China Medical System (CMS) is seeking a secondary listing on the mainboard of the Singapore Exchange (SGX) in July this year. CMS is a specialty pharma with a focus on sales and marketing in China, with capabilities across the full lifecycle of drug development, from identifying clinical needs to research and development (R&D) regulatory approval, and commercialisation. It has been listed on the Stock Exchange of Hong Kong since 2010. The pharmaceutical company expects the secondary listing will help it deepen its presence in South-east Asia and 'tap into a new and sophisticated investor base in Singapore'. CMS said it is looking to replicate its success in South-east Asia – building on the proven track record attained in China's pharmaceutical industry. 'This region, with a population of nearly 700 million, is experiencing surging pharmaceutical demand due to rapid economic growth, the rise of the middle class, ageing population, and the increasing burden of non-infectious diseases,' it said. BT in your inbox Start and end each day with the latest news stories and analyses delivered straight to your inbox. Sign Up Sign Up Its financial performance in 2023 and 2024 were hit by China's volume-based procurement (VBP) policy – three of its products were included in the VBP list. This policy aims to lower the prices of drugs with generic competition, by guaranteeing certain procurement volumes from public hospitals at significantly reduced prices through a bidding process. But CMS had a top-line rebound in H2 2024, driven by progress in commercialising innovative drugs and the continued growth of non-VBP exclusive products. The company moved towards innovative drugs, given that they typically enjoy a pricing advantage due to their exclusiveness, novelty and quality, and are supported by favourable government policies. It expects growth momentum will accelerate on the back of the replenishment of its pipeline of innovative drugs to about 40 products as at Dec 31, 2024. It noted four key platforms to scale its pharmaceutical ecosystem across Asia-Pacific. CMS R&D is involved in drug discovery and development targeting global markets, while PharmaGend is a development and manufacturing platform for regional manufacturing and supply. It also has Rxilient Health, a Singapore-headquartered entity focused on registration and commercialisation in South-east Asia and a Singapore venture arm, which makes strategic investments to support regional pharma innovation. In a statement on Jun 24, CMS said the proposed listing will not involve issuance of new shares, and the shares will continue to be primarily listed and traded on the Hong Kong Stock Exchange thereafter. Singapore is its regional headquarters for its South-east Asia and Middle East business, the company said. The announcement follows the news of several new listings on SGX – software services provider Info-Tech Systems, a data centre real estate investment trust (Reit) by Japanese telco Nippon Telegraph and Telephone (NTT), and a spin-off of mainboard-listed construction company Lum Chang Holdings' interior fit-out business. Info-Tech Systems, whose shares are expected to begin trading on Jul 4, is the first SGX mainboard listing in two years. NTT DC Reit, which will have a portfolio of six of NTT's data centre assets, will likely be the largest Singapore Reit listing in a decade. Meanwhile, interior fit-out business Lum Chang Creations is looking to list on the Catalist board.
Business Times
4 hours ago
- Politics
- Business Times
Trump's court win opens a path to clear hurdles to his agenda
[WASHINGTON, DC] The US Supreme Court's ruling curbing the power of judges to block government actions on a nationwide basis has raised questions about whether dozens of orders that have halted US President Donald Trump's policies will stand. The conservative majority's ruling Friday (Jun 27) came in a fight over Trump's plan to limit automatic birthright citizenship. But it may have far-reaching consequences for the ability of US courts to issue orders that apply to anyone affected by a policy, not just the parties who filed lawsuits. Judges entered nationwide preliminary orders halting Trump administration actions in at least four dozen of the 400 lawsuits filed since he took office in January, according to a Bloomberg News analysis. Some were later put on hold on appeal. Nationwide orders currently in place include blocks on the administration's revocation of foreign students' legal status, freezes of domestic spending and foreign aid, funding cuts related to gender-affirming care and legal services for migrant children, and proof-of-citizenship rules for voting. The Supreme Court's new precedent doesn't instantly invalidate injunctions in those cases. But the Justice Department could quickly ask federal judges to revisit the scope of these and other earlier orders in light of the opinion. 'Fair game' 'Everything is fair game,' said Dan Huff, a lawyer who served in the White House counsel's office during Trump's first term. BT in your inbox Start and end each day with the latest news stories and analyses delivered straight to your inbox. Sign Up Sign Up A Justice Department spokesperson did not immediately return a request for comment. Trump said at a press conference in the White House Friday that the administration will 'promptly file to proceed with numerous policies that have been wrongly enjoined on a nationwide basis'. Trump listed cases that they would target, including suspending refugee resettlement, freezing unnecessary funding and 'stopping federal taxpayers from paying for transgender surgeries'. The Trump administration has made it a priority to contest court orders that block policies on a nationwide, or universal, basis, although the controversy over whether those types of rulings are an appropriate use of judicial power has been brewing for years. Conservative advocates won such orders when Democratic presidents were in office as well. Noting the mounting pushback and debate, judges in dozens of other cases involving Trump's policies have limited their orders against the administration to the parties that sued or within certain geographical boundaries. Anastasia Boden, a senior attorney at the Pacific Legal Foundation whose practice includes suing the federal government, said she didn't see the ruling as a total 'retreat' from judges' authority to enter universal orders going forward. Multiple paths 'It's addressing the case where a plaintiff is getting relief that applies to everyone across the country merely because judges think that it's an important issue,' she said. 'But it doesn't change the case where the plaintiff needs that relief.' Boden offered the example of a challenge to government spending, in which the only way to halt an unlawful action would be to stop payment of federal dollars across the country, not just to individual plaintiffs or in certain areas. Trump's opponents say the justices' decision still leaves them with multiple paths to sue the administration over actions they contend are unlawful and even to argue for nationwide relief. Those options include class action lawsuits, cases seeking to set aside agency actions under a US law known as the Administrative Procedure Act and even continuing to argue that nationwide relief is the only way to stop harm to individual plaintiffs, like parties did in the birthright citizenship cases. But they also acknowledged the court significantly raised the burden of what they have to prove to win those types of orders. 'This is going to make it more challenging, more complicated, potentially more expensive to seek orders that more broadly stop illegal government action,' Cody Wofsy, deputy director of the ACLU Immigrants' Rights Project, said. 'It is watering down the power of federal courts to check government misconduct.' The Supreme Court sent the birthright citizenship cases back to lower court judges to reconsider the scope of orders pausing Trump's restrictions while the legal fight on its constitutionality continues. The justices did not rule on the core question of whether the policy itself is lawful. The administration can't fully enforce the birthright policy for at least another 30 days. Democratic state attorneys general involved in the birthright litigation highlighted language in Justice Amy Coney Barrett's majority opinion that the court didn't shut off the possibility that the states could still successfully argue for a nationwide order. Speaking with reporters after the ruling, New Jersey Attorney General Matthew Platkin said he and his Democratic colleagues would 'assess' the impact on other cases. He said they already had been judicious in asking judges for nationwide relief as opposed to orders that restricted administration policies in specific states. 'The court confirmed what we've thought all along – nationwide relief should be limited, but it is available to states when appropriate,' Platkin said. BLOOMBERG
Business Times
5 hours ago
- Automotive
- Business Times
Hong Kong's sixfold jump in share sales drives boom year in Asia
[HONG KONG] Hong Kong's having a banner year as it marches towards becoming the second-largest market globally for share sales for the first time since 2012. Proceeds from listings and additional share sales in the Asian financial hub in the first half have reached about US$33 billion, poised for a sixfold jump from a year ago, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. Offerings from electric carmakers BYD and Xiaomi raised the most, followed by Contemporary Amperex Technology Co (CATL), which had the world's biggest new listing this year. Investors have brushed aside tariffs and geopolitical concerns as deals flooded in Hong Kong – including three of the four biggest stock offerings in the world in 2025. Equity strategists remain upbeat about local stocks after the Hang Seng became one of the world's best-performing indexes this year. And with the throng of companies lining up with billion-dollar offerings, it's shaping up to be a good year for investment bankers in the city. 'We're seeing a lot more comfort from global investors around the global and regional macro picture, which is leading them to reassess and increase their exposure to the region including to Hong Kong and mainland China,' said Sunil Dhupelia, co-head of Asia Pacific ECM at JPMorgan Chase. 'Assuming that markets remain stable, it's likely to be very busy in the second half of the year.' Chinese companies that already have shares trading in Shenzhen or Shanghai have been flocking to Hong Kong for additional listings. Those so-called A-H deals accounted for about three-quarters of Hong Kong's total proceeds of US$13.4 billion from first-time share sales in 2025, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. BT in your inbox Start and end each day with the latest news stories and analyses delivered straight to your inbox. Sign Up Sign Up The biggest one was the US$5.2 billion offering by battery-giant CATL, which forged ahead with its Hong Kong listing in May despite being caught up in US-China tensions. The high-profile deal's success shows industry leaders are still able to find global buyers even in an unfavorable environment. Hong Kong listing proceeds are poised to double to a four-year high of more than US$22 billion, according to Bloomberg Intelligence. Big deals to look forward to later this year include those of electric carmaker Seres Group, heavy-machinery maker Sany Heavy Industry and pig breeder Muyuan Foods. Hong Kong Exchanges & Clearing, which is celebrating its 25th anniversary, is so fired up about the surge in business that it's parading the iconic gong used to introduce new listings in an unprecedented two-week public tour via a 'gongmobile'. Hong Kong is leading share sales overall in all of Asia-Pacific, where first-half proceeds have climbed almost 30 per cent to about US$100 billion in 2025, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. In India, which led the region in share sales last year, total proceeds stand at about US$20 billion, on track for a drop of more than 20 per cent in the first half, after a stock-market rout led to a slow start. Despite underperforming regional peers, the benchmark Nifty 50 Index has rallied as of late and is on track to post its best quarterly gain in more than a year. That optimism is spilling over to deals, with HDB Financial Services' US$1.5 billion initial public offering (IPO), and Tata Capital's soon-to-come US$2 billion IPO. Elsewhere, the US$4 billion chunk of Japan Post Bank Co sold by its parent and JX Advanced Metals' IPO helped share sale proceeds in Japan rise to US$13.7 billion, on course for a 30 per cent increase, though the pace of deals slowed during the second quarter, according to data compiled by Bloomberg. In South Korea, the recent presidential election ended of months of leadership vacuum, revitalising the Kospi and making it one of the region's best-performing indexes. That's encouraging more companies to pursue listings, such as Baby Shark-creator Pinkfong, the company behind the most watched YouTube video of all time. While geopolitical tensions are bound to continue to complicate decisions for corporate issuers and investors for months to come, Asia is on track to cap a great year of deals. 'We don't expect issuance activity to be slowing,' said Rob Chan, head of Asia ECM syndicate at Citigroup. 'In fact, despite all the uncertainties driven by tariffs and geopolitical tensions in recent months, issuance activity has been very strong.' Going forward, expect to see deals in Hong Kong from companies that mainly rely on Chinese domestic consumption because they are best shielded from tariff effects and geopolitics, according to Christine Xu, the partner in charge of Chinese ECM transactions at the Linklaters law firm. 'Enough water has gone under the bridge around the tariffs, and the market has taken that in its stride,' said JPMorgan's Dhupelia. 'Looking at the rest of the year, the ongoing complex global geopolitical situation is the clear risk that could change the direction of markets.' BLOOMBERG
