BloombergMoody’s Investors Service on Monday lowered Hong Kong’s rating as a long-term issuer of debt by one notch, just months after Fitch Ratings Ltd took a similar action amid political protests. Hong Kong has been rocked by pro-democracy protests, and clashes between demonstrators and the police which have broken out regularly since June last year. The Hong Kong government strongly disagreed with Moody’s assessment and said it was “deeply disappointed” by the decision to downgrade. “Moody’s rating falls way out of line with Hong Kong’s sound credit fundamentals,” a government spokesman said in a statement early yesterday. Because of Hong Kong’s low debt-to-GDP ratio, the downgrade was likely more significant for corporate borrowers, she added.

By Shelley Shan / Staff reporterHighway traffic is expected to pick up today as people start hitting the roads for the Lunar New Year holiday. The Directorate-General of Highways (DGH) unveiled its strategies for facilitating traffic flow on the upgraded Suhua Highway, which officially opened on Jan. 6. The highway’s traffic control center in Nanao Township (南澳) in Yilan County would use a traffic signal system to ease the congestion along certain sections, including between Chiang Wei-shui Memorial Freeway (Freeway No. From Tuesday to Wednesday next week, most highway travelers would be heading back to work, Chen added. 61), which was designed as an alternative to the Hsinchu-Tainan section of National Sun Yat-sen Freeway (Freeway No.

By Han Cheung / Staff reporterLast time the Year of the Rat rolled around, many people listened to the advice of fortune tellers and bought a rodent to attract wealth. Rodents Care has taken in over 2,000 animals since its founding in 2016, and the rescue rate continues to grow. The most important solution, Chang stresses, is to house one rodent in one cage. Chang says Rodents Care first started as a Facebook group around 2015. “We had to stress to the public that we are caring for pet rodents,” Chang says.

BloombergFrench President Emmanuel Macron and US President Donald Trump on Monday agreed to a truce in their dispute over digital taxes that would mean neither France nor the US would impose punitive tariffs this year, a French diplomat said. “Great discussion with @realDonaldTrump on digital tax,” Macron said in a tweet. The US objected, alleging on Dec. 2 that the French tax discriminates against US technology companies, citing Section 301 of a 1974 US law that Trump has thus far reserved to justify tariffs against China. That opened the door to the US’ threat to hit US$2.4 billion of French goods with tariffs in retaliation. Among the French products targeted with duties of as much as 100 percent were luxury items such as wine, cheese and makeup.

In less than a month, the outbreak has spread from Wuhan, China, to Beijing, Shanghai and Guandong Province. The Centers for Disease Control (CDC) has urged travel agents to avoid arranging tours to Wuhan or surrounding areas to lower the risk of travelers contracting the virus. Meanwhile, 178 Chinese tourists from Wuhan are to arrive between today and Wednesday next week, while 83 Taiwanese tourists are scheduled to go on package tours to Wuhan, local travel agencies said. “We have instructed travel agents to be especially vigilant of their guests’ health. Lion Travel said that it would also suspend sales for tours to Wuhan between March and May.

AFP, TANAUAN, PhilippinesPhilippine authorities yesterday ordered a crackdown on evacuees’ daily visits to their homes in the danger zone around Taal volcano as scientists warned it could be “recharging” for a more powerful explosion. “We are directing DRRMCs [Disaster Risk Reduction and Management Councils] ... not to allow anyone to enter the danger zone,” Philippine Undersecretary for the Interior Epimaco Densing said. The volcano shot ash 15km high in the Jan. 12 eruption, which crushed scores of homes and killed livestock as well as crops. However, seismologists have warned the volcano could imminently unleash a much bigger eruption, posing a deadly risk to anyone in the 14km radius “danger zone” that surrounds it. “Our concern is how are we going to sustain a long term evacuation period,” he added.

AFP, MADRIDAnder Mendez and his friends were hoping they had struck it rich with the idea of selling alcohol-infused gummy bears — until they found themselves in the sights of sweet giant Haribo. In a not-so-sweetly worded legal letter, Haribo has accused their start-up of infringing its trademarked little bear. In 2012, Haribo took legal action against Swiss chocolate maker Lindt, saying its hollow chocolate teddy bears wrapped in gold foil were an imitation of its products. Following a long-running legal battle, a German court ruled in Lindt’s favor, saying the chocolate bears could not be mistaken for Haribo’s jelly sweets. At the time, the award generated some controversy, with opposition figures saying the product would encourage the consumption of alcohol among youngsters.

By Lisa Wang / Staff reporterDelta Electronics Inc (台達電) is collaborating with UK-based GKN Automotive Ltd to develop new-generation three-in-one eDrive systems for battery electric and hybrid vehicles, the two companies said in a statement yesterday. The nation’s biggest power and thermal solutions provider is to provide inverters to be integrated with GKN Automotive’s eMotor and gearbox systems, the statement said. These would cover a large portion of the future eDrive market, which is projected to be worth more than ￡12 billion (US$15.59 billion) by 2030, the firms said, citing a forecast from IHS. “The eDrive market continues to accelerate as manufacturers are required to meet increasingly stringent emissions regulations demanding technological progression and speed,” GKN Automotive chief executive officer Liam Butterworth said in the statement. GKN Automotive had produced more than 1 million eDrive units as of July last year, the statement said.

By Aaron Tu and Dennis Xie / Staff reporter, with staff writerThe Chinese Communist Party (CCP) is likely to continue its carrot-and-stick approach toward Taiwan, but would become more polarizing, the Institute for National Defense and Security Research think tank said in a report last week. National security agencies in October last year found that China had attempted to interfere with the Jan. 11 presidential and legislative elections by poaching diplomatic allies, limiting Chinese tourism and heightening military threats, the report said. That Beijing is sticking to its script suggests that it is ignorant of the strong sentiment in Taiwan against Chinese President Xi Jinping’s (習近平) “one county, two systems” formula, it said. The Ministry of National Defense yesterday said that it shoulders responsibility for national security and it would respond promptly to any threat to regional security. As the Chinese government has neither confirmed nor denied the authenticity of the images, ministry officials said that it would treat the situation seriously.

By Crystal Hsu / Staff reporterThe TAIEX yesterday rose 0.24 percent to 12,118.71 points to close out the Year of the Pig with a 22 percent gain. On the last trading day of the old lunar year, global investors sought to take advantage of Taiwanese tech firms involved in the 5G as well as a recovery in the technology product cycle. Electronics stocks moved higher early on before some investors started moving to the sell side, but buying rotated to financial stocks to keep the TAIEX above 12,100 points. CTBC Investments said it expects corporate profits among local firms to grow 7.4 percent this year, but electronics firms might outperform with a 13.4 percent pickup. Trade tensions have prompted Chinese technology firms to cut dependence on US suppliers and shift orders to local vendors instead, it said.

By Lee I-chia and Shelley Shan / Staff reportersTaiwan yesterday set up an epidemic response command center to contain the spread of a new coronavirus, which was first discovered in Wuhan, China. The command center, led by Chou, is to be in charge of holding cross-ministerial discussions to improve preventive measures against “severe pneumonia with novel pathogens” in the nation. Taiwan currently has 44 million surgical masks and 1.9 million N95 masks, more than enough to meet demand, Chou said. A new confirmed case of a passenger from Wuhan detected with “severe pneumonia with novel pathogens” was reported on Sunday, CDC Deputy Director-General Chuang Jen-hsiang (莊人祥) said yesterday. All Taiwanese airlines and five Hong Kong and Macau-based airlines have started airing such information on board, it added.

Different from customs-cleared exports, export orders are a critical gauge of how actual exports are likely to perform in one to three months. Export orders totaled US$107.98 billion in the first quarter of last year. Last month, export orders inched up 0.9 percent from US$43.38 billion a year earlier, with the electronics segment showing the fastest pace of growth, ministry data showed. Last year as a whole, export orders contracted 5.3 percent annually to US$484.56 billion from US$511.82 billion, according to the statistics compiled by the ministry. “Easing trade tensions between the US and China played an important part in rebooting Taiwan’s export orders in December,” Huang said.

By Lo Chi / Staff reporterA recent study found four major public safety concerns at large retail stores, the Consumers’ Foundation said yesterday. From Jan. 8 to Wednesday last week, foundation volunteers visited 77 stores belonging to 34 businesses across Taiwan, including department stores and supermarkets, it said. Emergency exits must be kept shut to prevent the spread of smoke, Cheng said. According to Article 4 of the Consumer Protection Act (消費者保護法), businesses must emphasize consumers’ health and safety, foundation secretary-general Wu Jung-ta (吳榮達) said. Urging businesses to value public safety, the foundation said that government agencies should also perform consistent and thorough safety checks in public places to protect people’s safety.

By Lin Chia-nan / Staff reporterThe Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST) plans to set up new semiconductor research centers to boost industrial applications of space technology, quantum computing and artificial intelligence (AI), Minister of Science and Technology Chen Liang-gee (陳良基) said yesterday. After promoting the semiconductor “moonshot” program for nearly two years, the ministry is considering establishing new semiconductor research centers across the nation to create clusters of professionals, he said. However, the government could do more to increase the basic research budget, Chen said. By comparison, the research and development funding of private firms totals NT$450 billion every year, of which only a few percent is used to support academic research, he said, expressing hope that companies would devote more funding to academic research. The other 26 are Taiwanese, including seven who are joining natural science departments, 10 joining engineering departments, seven joining life sciences departments and two joining humanities departments, ministry data showed.

The airport handled 71.5 million passengers last year, a decline of 4.2 percent from a record 74.6 million the previous year, the Airport Authority of Hong Kong said in a statement. That meant Hong Kong slipped behind Shanghai and Guangzhou, which processed 76.1 million and 73.4 million domestic and international passengers respectively. Inbound traffic to Hong Kong plunged 48 percent last year to 35.66 million, the first decline since 2009, the Hong Kong Civil Aviation Department said. The territory topped Vancouver and Sydney as the most unaffordable housing market last year, according to a report yesterday by urban planning policy consultancy Demographia. Melbourne remained the fourth-most unaffordable housing market, while Toronto and Auckland climbed to sixth place.