27/10/2017 Asia Business Report

of helping her husband prepare

to carry out an act of terrorism.

Madihah Taheer had bought him

a large combat knife

to use in an attack.

Now on BBC News all the latest

business news live from Singapore.

Anderson and Alphabet do not

disappoint their

Anderson and Alphabet do not

disappoint their investors as shares

surged beyond expectations. A sign

of The Times, the last day of floor

trading on the Hong Kong stock

exchange.

Welcome to Asia Business Report.

A bumper crop of tech earnings have

shown stellar results. Online

companies like Amazon and Alphabet,

Google+ parent company, delivered

better earnings and sent stocks

soaring.

I spoke to our North America

technology reporter in San Francisco

and asked if Twitter could turn a

profit in the not too distant

future...

This is one of the best

days on the stock market that

Twitter has had since it went public

in a few years ago. The CEO says

that in the next quarter, because

they could raise costs and revenue

in the licensing side of the

business, for the first time in the

company's history they could turn a

profit.

It was a busy day in terms

of earnings, we heard from Amazon as

well as Alphabet, what did they tell

us?

A busy day indeed. Amazon had an

incredibly strong showing, not a

great increase in profit but

investors are often more worried

about growth at Amazon and they have

excelled there today. Revenues at

$43.7 billion in the last quarter,

up 34% on this time last year. A big

jump. Some of the money has come

from All foods, you will remember

that Amazon bought them back in

August for just over $13 billion. --

Whole Foods. Bringing in extra

revenue for the company,

contributing to an enormous figure

of $43.7 billion for the last

quarter. Alphabet has had a strong

quarter, their profits are the key

figure. 833% rise in profits

compared to this time last year.

But, there are a of slightly

troubling alphabet earnings. The

TAC, the amount of money that Google

has to pay in order to get people

looking at its ads, placing those in

certain areas of the Internet. They

spent more than $5 billion on

traffic acquisition in the last

quarter, up considerably more than

analysts hoped. Good news for

Alphabet but there are troubling

signs in there as well.

And another

business news... Toymaker Mattel is

suspending its quarterly dividends

after they suffered a head from the

bankruptcy of its largest retailer,

Toys "R" Us. Their shares sell 16%

to $13 when the company said they

suffered a loss of more than $600

million in the three months which

ended in September. The California

-based company was also heard by

weak demand of its core products

like Barbie, Hot Wheels, Thomas and

Friends and Monster Hi. His message

will focus on creating a sustainable

wealth for all. Earlier, I was

joined by Joss and asked if the

Prime Minister can offer to entice

voters.

I think the point is

Malaysia is in a good place now.

Growth is on an upswing and

government revenues have recovered.

There is an improvement in the

revenues from the oil and the

sector, with additional dividends

for the second half of the year.

There is a lot of flexibility to

continue with fiscal consolidation,

which is lower budget deficits,

moving towards a neutral deficit.

Suspending wages which have been on

an upward trend over the years.

Increasing measures which help

private consumption.

What will be

puzzling to viewers, especially

outside of Malaysia, that he remains

quite popular in spite of the

ongoing scandals surrounding one

ADB. Is that partly because of the

economy performance?

Most of the

data suggests the economy and

Malaysia has seen one of the

strongest recoveries, and the growth

is broad-based. Consumption is above

trend in recent years. We have seen

a growth in exports in addition to

investment so the economic outlook

is quite bright in Malaysia and for

the most part, we expect it to

continue into the next two years.

What kinds of measures can we expect

which would help ordinary people?

On

the revenue side, tax has been a

large driver of revenue and has a

negative impact for the lower income

brackets in the population. Part of

the spending can offset the impact

of GST, boosting revenues. That's

where we have welfare payments in

addition to broader spending on

wages. That is something the Prime

Minister promised or at least

suggested to civil servants a few

weeks back. We can expect the trend

to continue. It doesn't mean that

the economy will be deprived of

infrastructure spending. The

coalition government is good at

incorporating budget financing like

contributions from private

investors, as well as in Chinese

infrastructure.

P45th Tokyo motor

show opens its doors to the public

at the weekend where Japanese

car-makers will be showing off the

latest technology. It comes at a

time where the image of Japanese

quality has taken a hit from

scandals like the Nissan airbag

recalls. Earlier, I spoke to an

analyst in Tokyo.

We have a lot of

companies introducing automatic

driving cars, all of those old

companies are eager to start using

those models.

And it comes at a time

when we've had quite a lot of

scandals from Japanese companies,

Nissan and Kobe steel. Those

scandals are quite different but has

it been talked about in the industry

a lot? The quality of made in Japan?

I do not think there is any major

problem in the quality front of

Japanese products. At this point,

the biggest questions are

surrounding compliance and

especially Nissan, the day did not

really follow. The procedure of

inspection in Japan. That's been the

case because many of those companies

are getting used to 20 or 30 years

of traditional practice. They are

providing -- it is busy. These

different factors relating to those

companies and the procedure of

inspections, but it does not

necessarily mean that there is an

immediate threat.

The end of an era,

the Hong Kong stock exchange will

close the trading floor after 31

years on Friday. In its heyday, the

floor was home to more than 1000

stockbrokers but the rise of

electronic and Internet training has

changed the industry.

FUNKY MUSIC

TRANSLATION:

The world is changing,

financial technology is changing. We

should get with The Times, even if

we don't want to go.

TRANSLATION:

I

started as a broker after finishing

school. It's been over 40 years.

They used to be four exchanges. It

combined to become one exchange in

1986, and we moved into this hole.

-- wall. We have a deep affinity

with the place. We work together

side by side chatting all to

-- chatting all day. At the time,

the electronic trading system was

not as developed as it is now. All

transactions had to go through a

centralised system. There were

thousands of people here. Printers

were running all the time. It was a

noisy and busy atmosphere. We

started as just a small regional

stock exchange. Then it became an

international financial centre.

Stockbrokers have gone through

countless financial crises that we

have persevered. Stockbrokers make

great contributions. This is

something we are very proud of.

Next

hour, we will be speaking to Juliana

at the stock exchange. Stay tuned

for that. In the markets... This is

how Asia has opened.

We will continue to monitor shares

in Kobe steel and Nissan as well.

That's all for this edition of Asia

Business Report. Sport Today is

coming up next.