Facebook Instagram Linkedin Twitter Youtube
Home Blog Page 6449

DoE proposes agency with power to cap fuel prices

PHILSTAR FILE PHOTO

THE DEPARTMENT of Energy (DoE) proposed on Thursday an independent body with the authority to cap retail fuel prices when they exceed “reasonable” levels.

At a House committee hearing Thursday, Oil Industry Management Bureau Director Rino E. Abad said that the proposed body will evaluate the “reasonableness” of pump price adjustments.

“(We propose that) the independent body issue a pump price cap on municipalities or cities that are subject to investigation upon a finding that there is indeed unreasonable price implementation,” he said. Doing this would require amendments to the oil deregulation law.

The DoE said it also wants to suspend fuel excise taxes by amending the Tax Reform for Acceleration and Inclusion (TRAIN) Law.

Mr. Abad said TRAIN provides that if the average Dubai Crude price exceeds $80 per barrel over three months, fuel excise taxes will be suspended. However, this provision only covered the years 2018 to 2020.

“I hope the committee would consider that Section 43 (of the TRAIN Law) be amended to allow the suspension of the excise tax on petroleum products by the DBCC (Development Budget Coordination Committee) even beyond the 2020 timeframe as long as the average Dubai Crude Oil price for the previous month reaches or exceeds $80 per barrel,” he said.

At present, excise taxes on gasoline, diesel and kerosene are at P10 per liter (/L), P6/L and P5/L, respectively.

At the hearing, the Department of Finance (DoF) said it does not support the DoE’s proposal to halt the collection of fuel excise taxes because it will result in “significant foregone revenue.”

“Suspending all the fuel excise taxes and the VAT (value-added tax) on fuel excise will result in revenue losses of up to P147.1 billion or around 0.7% of GDP (gross domestic product) in 2022,” according to Euvimil Nina R. Asuncion, a director in the DoF’s Revenue Operations Group.

By suspending fuel excise taxes, the government may also reverse reforms that have made the tax system more equitable, with the effect of subsidizing consumption of high-income households.

“(Suspending fuel excise taxes) will be detrimental to our recovery and long-term growth and it is inequitable. The better and more equitable way to address the impact of increasing fuel prices is to provide swift and targeted support to the vulnerable sectors,” Ms. Asuncion said.

She added that the government has pledged to support the transportation sector deal with oil price increases to do away with the need to suspend excise taxes on fuel.

Energy Secretary Alfonso G. Cusi has said that removing excise taxes might reduce pump prices by P8 to P10 per liter.

Oil companies have raised prices for a ninth straight week.

This week, they increased gasoline, diesel and kerosene prices by P1.15/L, P0.45/L and P0.55/L, respectively. — Angelica Y. Yang

Biopharma, medtech to fuel healthcare investment opportunities in Asia, investment experts say 

REUTERS

By Patricia Mirasol  

Biopharma (or pharmaceuticals manufactured by biotechnology methods) and medical technology (medtech) are the biggest healthcare investment opportunities in the Asia Pacific region, according to investment experts from the region.  

“I’m excited by opportunities in biopharma. It’s attracted a lot of capital with a lot of innovation coming in… That’s the biggest opportunity in Asia over the next several years,” said Vikram Kapur, partner and Asia Pacific (APAC) Healthcare Practice head of Bain & Company, a global consultancy, in an Oct. 28 webinar on the topic.  

In 2020, healthcare investors in APAC deployed $16.9 billion dollars of capital, up from $11 billion the previous year, as per Bain & Company’s 2021 report. The biopharma sector secured over half of this capital, with 86 deals in 2020 as compared to 28 in 2019. 

Among the firms that snagged biopharma investments were China- and South Korea-based ones developing CAR (Chimeric antigen receptor) T-cell therapy, a treatment that changes immune cells in the lab so they can seek and destroy cancer cells.  

Healthcare, Mr. Kapur said, is almost like the next national defense. A lot of nations now have universal healthcare, with regulations that now exist to support telemedicine and digital health. 

This is a situation where “turbulence attracts capital,” Mr. Kapur told the webinar audience. “I’m hopeful the trend continues.”  

TRANSFORMATIONAL
For Johnson & Johnson Innovation, the venture capital arm of Johnson & Johnson, a pharmaceutical company, a key criterion for supporting an innovation is its transformational aspect.  

“[We look for those] that might change the standard of care and… shift to a framework that is viable to future needs,” said Andrew Wong, Johnson & Johnson Innovation APAC’s regional vice-president for Early Innovation Partnering. An analogy between incremental versus transformational, he added, would be coming up with a better candle versus coming up with a lightbulb.  

One medical technology application Johnson & Johnson Innovation has bet on is the MONARCH Platform. Developed by California-based Auris Health, Inc., the system uses robotics, software, and endoscopy to help doctors view – and get a tissue sample from – a patient’s lungs.  

As with any type of business, execution is key. 

Technology will not walk itself out of the lab, said Simone Song, founder and senior partner of ORI Capital, a Hong Kong-based venture capital firm with a focus on healthcare innovation.  

“The skills required to run a company are different from the skills required to be great at a lab,” she said at the Oct. 28 virtual event. “We look at the quality of the team, the shareholders, and the investors… If the science is there, if the team is there, that will make me jump [at the opportunity].”

Better school, family environments key to improved reading comprehension — DLSU study 

PHILSTAR

By Bronte H. Lacsamana 

The Filipino students who scored poorly in reading comprehension in the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) in 2018 mostly come from low-income backgrounds where family and school environments do not motivate growth mindsets, according to the findings of a machine learning (ML) study by the Dr. Andrew L. Tan Data Science Institute (ALTDSI) of De La Salle University (DLSU). 

Eighty percent of the Filipino students, all aged 15 years old, scored below level 2, PISA’s recommended minimum proficiency level. Of these, 83% came from public schools.  

“Students belonging to lower income groups may find academic requirements as a burden as they prioritize work to help their families earn a living,” said Rochelle Irene G. Lucas, Chair of DLSU’s Department of English and Applied Linguistics, at a webinar where the results were unveiled. “To them, reading becomes a task solely associated with school requirements and considered as just a waste of time and resources.” 

Though the relation between socioeconomic background and educational attainment is not new, she added that the data science findings confirmed the important role of a child’s environment and available resources in motivating them to learn and improve.   

“Reading is substantial in a child’s understanding of concepts in math, science, and other subject areas, so that’s why they tend to score low in those areas as well,” she answered, on why the study focused on reading comprehension. 

Macario O. Cordel II, dean of ALTDSI explained the need for a data mining algorithm based on computational game theory: “If you look at the data set, you have thousands of variables to consider, and then thousands of student data that you need to crunch.”  

He and his team also revealed a glimpse of data visualizations grouping the students by region on the Philippine map and providing relevant information about their learning environments and scores. They plan to publish the visual map online in the near future.   

FOUR FACTORS
The study was able to cluster 20 variables in a student’s environment into four factors: reading, teaching, ICT (information communication technology), and motivation. 

The reading variables include negative reading self-concept, low awareness of reading strategies, low enjoyment of reading, and low reading of fiction for leisure.   

“These are students who have already identified themselves as having difficulty in reading, which ties into their motivation,” said Allan Benedict I. Bernardo, Chair of DLSU’s Counseling and Educational Psychology Department.   

He added that teaching variables — frequent teacher feedback, asking students their thoughts on the reading material, and low teacher enthusiasm — did little to help. The negative feedback and tendency to put students on the spot often demotivated them.  

Meanwhile, the lack of ICT resources, common in public schools and low-income households, provided no opportunity to make learning interactive.  

“Access to ICT can be an important entry point in changing experiences of the family,” he explained. The variables under ICT were low ICT resources at home and infrequent use of ICT to learn about topics, chat with classmates, or read e-mails.  

Finally, motivational variables proved the need for socio-psychological focus on students as well, according to Mr. Bernardo: “What our research shows is that if we focus on the social and psychological experiences of these learners, we predict in a very high level of accuracy who are the poor readers and who are the better readers.” 

The motivational variables include low persistence in mastering tasks, low mastery learning goals, low valuing for schooling, low expected occupational status after high school, and low growth mindset beliefs. 

INTERVENTIONS
English and linguistics professor Ms. Lucas suggested that, with the family as a child’s major influence, parents could be taught to nurture reading habits in the household. 

“There was a reading caravan that we did a decade ago which also taught parents how to read to their kids,” she shared. “They were able to read together in their free time.”  

As for improving the current curriculum, Mr. Bernardo noted the efforts of the Department of Education: “DepEd is now very much focused on the curriculum as a response to PISA and there has been a long-standing interest in focusing on instruction, but we should not be content with a ‘one size fits all’ type of intervention.”  

Aside from reaching students and their families and tweaking the curriculum, the research team implored policymakers and other education stakeholders to take a look at the bigger picture.  

“Even if motivation resides in an individual, the socioeconomic model suggests that these motivational sets do not occur in a vacuum. They are adapted within these communities,” explained Mr. Bernardo.  

He added that, in the larger social environment, if celebrities and politicians became models of success in spite of low academic achievement, it would foster a culture where education is not important.  

“The students are not blank slates. They’re making these motivational choices based on what they see — in school, in their families, on TV, in larger society, in their barangays. It’s not just working on the student, but on the environment itself,” he said.

That creeping game changer

STOCK PHOTO | ZBYNEK BURIVAL-UNSPLASH

For those of us old enough to remember, the sharp increases in oil prices led to the oil crises in 1973 and 1979. Output slumped in the US, Europe, and Japan by sizeable amounts in 1973 while the global economy dropped by about 3% in 1979. In developing countries like the Philippines, we experienced queuing up for rationed fuel in gas stations.

OPEC nations made hundreds of billions of petrodollars, with collateral benefits to Russia and Norway. In the absence of sufficient investment outlets in the oil-exporting nations, these petrodollars were recycled to both the US and Europe.

While a scourge to many countries, the oil crisis was a compelling incentive to explore various energy sources other than fossil fuel. OPEC supremacy in oil politics unmasked the vulnerability of Western economies to external events outside their control. Climate change prompted investments in research focused on wind and solar power technologies while advocacies to reduce oil consumption and greenhouse gas emissions proliferated in both advanced economies and emerging markets. Renewable energy became the buzzword.

We need to jog our memory to realize how oil prices have climbed to dizzying heights. In 1973-74 when OPEC declared an oil embargo against pro-Israel countries, oil prices rose from $3 to $12 per barrel, or 300%. In 1979-80, a drop in oil production due to the Iranian Revolution saw oil prices escalating to over $39 per barrel.

Unfortunately, we are again seeing the same oil dynamics today.

Brent and Dubai oil prices have been rising fast. From $42.15 and $42.30 per barrel averages, respectively, in 2020, they climbed to $67.25 and $69.01 per barrel averages for nearly 10 months this year. These gains were huge, nearly 60% for Brent and 63% for Dubai.

As of Oct. 25, Brent and Dubai have risen to $82.87 and $85.36 per barrel, respectively.

Some long-term factors appear at work. Supply and delivery hub inventories are down because of extraordinary recoveries in demand from major economies. Typhoon Ida in the US also reportedly shut down at least nine refineries. OPEC has sustained its production cutback for some time now. To adjust to the emerging situation, there has been steady decumulation of oil reserves in many countries.

The long-term prospects are not very promising. Investment in new rigs and wells, natural gas hubs, and even coal mines has been minimal resulting in a global energy shortage.

Therefore, we see that the significant increase in oil prices is driving up local fuel prices and, by extension, many food and non-food commodities in the consumer basket.

It was Energy Secretary Al Cusi who spoke on the possibility of suspending the excise tax on fuel products. He expects that this could reduce pump prices by some P8 to P10 per liter. Cusi was correct in saying that an executive order is not enough to implement his proposal. A congressional action is required. While the Bayanihan Law contained a mechanism for suspending the excise tax when oil prices hit certain thresholds, the period of implementation has elapsed. Only the years 2018-2020 were covered. The TRAIN (Tax Reform for Acceleration and Inclusion) Law slaps duties on both gasoline and diesel with no provision for automatic adjustment.

Some presidential aspirants, before and after Cusi spoke, have also sounded the alarm against the continued implementation of this tax measure because the transport sector is affected and consumers would have to suffer, too. High prices affect everyone, but the poor have the least capacity to absorb them. It is very tempting to go populist.

What is being asked may not exactly be a zero-sum game, but the risks are just too great to be ignored.

The Department of Finance’s argument against this proposal is more than compelling. If Congress should legislate the suspension of the oil tax, the National Government (NG) stands to lose some P131 billion in 2022, or around 3% of the proposed P5-trillion budget for 2022.

This potential loss derives from the P24.7 billion from the Bureau of Customs (BoC) baseline excise collection and P106.7 billion incremental excise revenue collection.

Suspending the excise tax would require a budget realignment to ensure that the portion for pandemic management and economic recovery are kept intact. But the practical problem is that everything has been earmarked by this time to finance, for instance, infrastructure especially during this election time, intelligence fund, the pension of uniformed personnel, anti-insurgency measures and other similar objects of public spending. In short, an enlightened budget realignment may not be possible even if the amount involved is only 3% of the overall budget. No one department would budge.

The outcome is inexorably a larger fiscal deficit, and the only solution is for Finance Secretary Sonny Dominguez to further increase the nation’s borrowing, and in the process further bloat the debt to GDP ratio. Next year’s fiscal deficit to GDP ratio is projected at an already high 7.5% while NG’s debt to GDP ratio has already exceeded 60% as early as June of this year.

We might be understating the consequences of bad public finance but one can expect tremendous impact on investor confidence in the Philippines, cost of both sovereign and corporate credit, and ultimately on the cost of doing business in the Philippines. We worked hard to convince the world that our territory is truly investment grade, invite investors to put up production outfits here and employ more of our people, and, in the process, enlarge the economic base of our democracy. The tragic results of the pandemic on our people’s lives and livelihood should be enough.

We support the position that we should keep the excise tax on fuel products. While higher oil prices and inflation could indeed weigh on our economic recovery, it is our success in neutralizing the pandemic that should inspire greater confidence among consumers to spend and investors to start manufacturing and hiring people. Keeping the budget for pandemic mitigation is non-negotiable and should be kept away from fraud and conspiracy.

Equally important, suspending the excise tax on fuel, while benefiting the poor, would also benefit those who could very well afford high fuel pump prices. What would happen to energy conservation and minimizing gas emissions? This move can be regressive.

To achieve targeted and direct support to transport groups and ensure minimal adjustment to transport costs, our finance officials could consider providing some direct subsidy, to the extent allowed by law and the budget process. Already, we heard the Development Budget Coordination Committee approved, and this was announced the other day, some P1 billion in subsidy that would be extended by the NG to some 178,000 registered public utility drivers to help them cope with this series of oil price escalations. This is a good approach to ensure that the subsidy is given “directly to the driver.” This is the essence of transparent fiscal policy.

As we recover from the pandemic, and as health protocols would allow, the transport group’s petition for an increase in the authorized capacity of public utility vehicles may also merit serious study. The Department of Transportation recently cited some scientific studies in some countries and a report by the British Medical Journal that “public transport capacity has no significant correlation with the number of COVID-19 cases.”

To many, scrapping the excise tax on fuel could be a game changer in addressing inflation and helping the poor. This is what is salient about the proposal, but this salience effect could also distort our perspective on the more important, though less obvious, bad consequences of this regressive proposal on our desire to recover from the pandemic and economic recession.

 

Diwa C. Guinigundo is the former deputy governor for the Monetary and Economics Sector, the Bangko Sentral ng Pilipinas (BSP). He served the BSP for 41 years. In 2001-2003, he was alternate executive director at the International Monetary Fund in Washington, DC. He is the senior pastor of the Fullness of Christ International Ministries in Mandaluyong.

Legacy of violence

BW FILE PHOTO

As flawed as they have been, every Philippine administration has nevertheless managed to leave behind some sort of legacy. The six-year Presidential term mandated by the Constitution was thought to be long enough for the head of State and his officials to achieve and leave something behind them, despite bureaucratic inefficiency, political accommodation and compromise, and the corruption that has taken deep roots in such agencies as public works, customs, and even education. There is also every President’s limitations in terms of dedication to the tasks at hand and the capacity to transcend his or her personal, familial, and class interests.

Thus did Ferdinand Marcos manage to achieve something despite his lust for power and pelf, the human rights violations of his regime, and its world-class corruption that bloated the national debt to over $30 billion without benefiting anyone but himself. Even worse is the long-term harm he inflicted on this country’s governance when he transformed the military into power brokers whose support has been crucial to every regime that followed his.

But Marcos did build roads and bridges. He constructed hospitals, reestablished diplomatic relations with China, opened a “window to the East” with the USSR, and strengthened the country’s links with the oil-rich countries of the Middle East.

He was, after all, ensconced in Malacañang for all of 21 years (1965-1986). Not even the most incompetent bureaucrat with the worst of intentions could have failed to achieve something in those two decades of being in power, of which 14 years were as absolute ruler. But all these practically come to naught when weighed against his regime’s crimes and misdeeds that were directly responsible for the suffering and deaths of thousands, and, indirectly, those of millions more.

Of the administrations that followed his, although hampered by police and military resistance, Corazon Aquino’s was the most committed to the defense of human rights. Though dampened, that legacy managed to survive the Ramos, Estrada, and Macapagal-Arroyo regimes and that of her son Benigno Aquino III.

Despite the coup attempts that troubled her six years in office, Mrs. Aquino left behind a new Constitution distinguished by its reform-minded drafters’ determination to prevent the repetition of the horrors of the Marcos past through its Bill of Rights and the safeguards they put in place against the imposition of martial law by an authoritarian head of State.

Those provisions have unfortunately not been enough to protect the critics and dissenters no truly democratic society can do without. Spawned by the violence of provincial politics, the Duterte despotism is likely to go down in history as the only Philippine regime whose head was prosecuted for crimes against humanity by the International Criminal Court (ICC). In fear of that possibility, it is currently engaged in a self-serving but failing campaign to prove that, as one of its less than outstanding legal minds keeps claiming, the justice system is “robust and functional.” But its most recent attempt in that enterprise is itself demonstrating that the system is practically dead and dysfunctional.

A Department of Justice (DoJ) report on its widely publicized investigation into 52 “drug war”-related killings rejected the “nanlaban” (fought back) police buzzword used to explain away the killing of drug suspects. But rather than being criminally charged in court, some of the policemen involved have merely been dismissed from the service, or, worse, only suspended. And 52 cases out of the over 6,000 killings the police themselves admit — human rights groups put the numbers at over 30,000 — had taken place because the victims “fought back” is so obviously such a small number that the so-called DoJ investigation is itself demonstrating that impunity reigns, and the justice system is not working as it should.

Secure in the knowledge that they will be immune from prosecution as President Rodrigo Duterte has repeatedly assured them, the police have not relented either in their use of violence against regime critics, human rights defenders, social and political activists, grassroots lawyers, and other dissenters. And neither have they spared, in the time of COVID-19, even those they accuse of violating quarantine protocols and curfew restrictions.

Several cases of police extortion and rape were reported by the media this October alone against those apprehended during curfew hours or for not wearing face masks and/or face shields. Twenty people had earlier been killed by police and other State actors from January to July this year according to media reports. From August to October, there were five instances of police brutality and abuses, among them the killing of a Manila curfew violator, the sexual harassment of a 19-year-old Bataan woman accused of non-observance of quarantine restrictions, and several policemen’s demanding P50,000 from three people they had apprehended during curfew hours. These incidents followed those of 2020, such as that of the rape of an alleged prostitute by several policemen.

Police violence and impunity have become so much a part of the “new normal” that even some local officials and barangay tanod have been emboldened into abusing citizens for the flimsiest of reasons. Those abuses have included putting people in dog cages, making them stand bareheaded under the heat of the summer sun, and forcing at least one man to do exercise so strenuous it killed him. With the thousands of police apprehensions for alleged violations of curfew and quarantine protocols, more such cases are likely to have been, and to be, unreported.

The roots of the extrajudicial killings and these egregious abuses should by now be evident to everyone except the willfully blind or those who brazenly lie to the public to advance their political and economic interests.

On record is Mr. Duterte’s admission during one of his television appearances that (as translated from the original English and Filipino mix), “My orders to the police and military, and to local officials as well, is that if any troublemaker creates a disturbance and fights back, shoot them dead. Instead of letting you (‘troublemakers’) cause any disturbance, I will bury you.”

Violence is endemic in the Philippines. Its history is replete with uprisings and the repression that has always been the ruling elite’s answer to social unrest. But never since the Marcos kleptocracy have the police and other State agents been as empowered and encouraged than today to freely use armed violence against the citizens they are sworn to protect.

Mr. Duterte claims the Universal Access to Quality Tertiary Education Act (RA 10931) and his “Build, Build, Build” program among his legacies. But the free college education bill was the initiative of, and was filed by, Senators Ralph Recto and Paolo Benigno “Bam” Aquino IV; and most of the projects in his BBB program are yet to be completed.

His predecessors’ legacies to Philippine society may be as troubling, as incomplete, or even as totally useless to anyone but themselves. But Mr. Duterte’s contempt for human rights and for the Constitution that protects them has made violence and abuse of power his troubling legacy not only to those who saw through him in 2016, but also to those who elected him then.

Rejecting that dark “gift” is among the central tasks of the next administration. It should restore the respect for the right to life to which every human being is entitled, and the civility vital to democratization and informed discourse.

Add that imperative to the lengthening list of reasons why the 2022 elections are so crucial to the life and future of this long-suffering nation.

 

Luis V. Teodoro is on Facebook and Twitter (@luisteodoro).

www.luisteodoro.com

The Godfather, $700 billion, and a crazy game of chicken

BRIAN KOSTIUK-UNSPLASH

GLOBAL INVESTORS are in for a treat. An extremely expensive game of one-upmanship is being played out in the semiconductor industry where the winners will look like heroes and the rest may not even survive. 

All told, more than $700 billion has been pledged over the next decade to expand production capacity for the chips that run smartphones, power data centers, and one day will drive cars. Samsung Electronics Co. is the latest show its hand, reporting third-quarter numbers that put it on track to post record spending for 2021 and setting it up for even more next year. In August the South Korean giant said it will bring forward plans to invest $150 billion on advanced chipmaking, joining Taiwan Semiconductor Manufacturing Co., Intel Corp., Micron Technology, Inc., and SK Hynix, Inc. in a massive gamble that the world’s appetite for electronics will continue unabated. By comparison, those five companies shelled out just $70 billion in 2018.

This sudden hunger for capacity is being pinned on the recent component shortage that’s crimped automobile output and driven up prices. Yet the latest data on lead times between orders and delivery indicate this crisis has already peaked.

Beyond this short-term hiccup, executives are betting that a confluence of 5G mobile communications, artificial intelligence, and greater automation across industries including transport and manufacturing will create a sustained need for more chips.

They might be right, but that still doesn’t justify their ridiculous spending plans.

Instead, it seems nationalism and government interference are having an outsize influence on market forces, which will result in excessive expansion that won’t be matched by even the most bullish of demand scenarios.

Samsung said Thursday it plans to triple some capacity by 2026, which comes in the context of a bold blueprint outlined earlier this year by South Korean President Moon Jae-in aimed at keeping the nation’s place as a technology powerhouse. Between them, Samsung and SK Hynix expect to spend around $450 billion in the coming decade with more than 150 other companies as part of a coordinated effort to continue the development and production of semiconductors, which the government calls a “strategic weapon.”

Intel Chief Executive Officer Pat Gelsinger and Micron CEO Sanjay Mehrotra are determined not to let the US fall behind either, and have spent much of this year lobbying Washington for handouts to fund their own expensive programs. Micron last week pledged $150 billion on factories and R&D over the next 10 years and made clear that it expects the government to give grants and tax breaks to help make that happen.

Gelsinger and his team have been less subtle about their demands. The 60-year-old, who returned to helm Intel after more than a decade away, is boosting spending by 30% this year to $19 billion and is likely to increase that figure three-fold over the next few years as he seeks to catch up with TSMC and Samsung. But plans to develop a new factory on US soil “would be very difficult” without the government doling out more than $50 billion of incentives outlined in the bipartisan CHIPS act that’s yet to pass the House, government relations chief Al Thompson told Bloomberg News last week.

In the middle of this is global leader TSMC, which is being courted by governments around the world but would much rather keep its factories at home. Political pressure from Washington, coupled with generous enticements, left the Hsinchu-based company with little choice but to announce a new factory in Arizona, just down the road from one of Intel’s largest operations.

But company founder and former Chairman Morris Chang hasn’t minced words on US hopes of revitalizing a sector that lends its name to Silicon Valley. Known as the Godfather of the local chip industry, Chang has repeatedly noted that high costs, a dearth of local suppliers, and comparative lack of talent puts the US behind Taiwan and other nations. Gelsinger’s argument that the industry needs to be re-shored are driven by self-interest, Chang said this week in Taipei.

The problem for Intel and those in Washington is that Chang, himself a US citizen, is not wrong. Intel fell behind in manufacturing technology, lost ground in computer processors to local rival Advanced Micro Devices, Inc., and was recently dumped by Apple, Inc. Gelsinger is pinning his hopes of returning the company to relevance on a brash plan to expand capacity and enter the chip foundry business dominated by TSMC and Samsung. But to pay for it, as Thompson noted, the company needs American taxpayer help.

Seoul also doesn’t want to fall behind. While China is lagging in semiconductor technology, it may pose a threat in memory chips — the bread and butter of South Korea’s industry and a commodity product sold mostly on price. An onslaught of cheap components could strike a painful, though not fatal, blow to Samsung and SK Hynix. The natural response is to boost capacity and technology to stay ahead of the game, while also allowing it to move into new areas like telecommunications and AI.

But even with the looming adoption of more advanced semiconductors, there won’t be enough growth to cover the costs.

By my calculations, the top five semiconductor manufacturers — which between them account for half the market — will spend close to $150 billion on capex in 2023, almost double what they shelled out in 2019 and around 50% more than projections for this year. Yet, according to trade group WSTS, global semiconductor growth is likely to climb just 10% next year. Data compiled by Bloomberg Intelligence suggest even more sedate numbers with just 4% expansion next year and only 9% from 2021 to 2023.   

We’re already seeing signs that supply is outpacing demand in memory, which this year will account for 29% of the chip market, resulting in falling prices.

If trade groups and analysts envision only modest growth in coming years, you can be sure industry executives do, too. That means their aggressive capacity expansion isn’t driven by a deep belief that the market is truly going to double in just four years, as their spending suggests, but that they’re in a desperate land grab hoping that size and capacity will be enough to muscle out rivals.

TSMC’s Chang is right that the lobbying efforts are driven by self-interest. But cheered on and funded by eager politicians, global semiconductor companies are accelerating toward a capex cliff. Let’s see who flinches first, and who plunges off the edge.

BLOOMBERG OPINION

Being Oxbridge

JEAN LUC BENAZET-UNSPLASH

So, it started with the Sorbonne, when a frustrated Henry II decided to recall all English students from Paris in the 12th century and housed them instead in Oxford. Many of the early students were from the clergy (at that time the most likely able to read and write, hence “clerical” work). Trinity College, for example, started out as a training house for Catholic priests. Remnants of that religious origin can be seen in the semestral terms: Michaelmas (Feast of St. Michael and All Angels), Lent, and Easter.

Students were derisively called “gownies” (from the black gown worn for school activities) by the natives of Oxfordshire (called, naturally, “townies”). Things became quite heated between town and gown that eventually some of the students decided to call it quits and in 1209 moved to another part of England. Thus, Cambridge University.

Peterhouse is the oldest Cambridge college (famous Petreans include Charles Babbage and James Mason) and Cambridge got a huge boost with the coming of Erasmus, who duly implemented Renaissance style learning in the place.

As an aside (and purely as an aside), a bunch of Cambridge graduates that somehow ended up in the United States missed their alma mater so much they decided to build a similar institute of higher learning. Settling in a town named (what else?) Cambridge (in Massachusetts), the organizers found themselves a donor and a new university was born. The name of the generous benefactor? John Harvard.

But going back to the two universities that really matter, graduates of Oxford are called Oxonians and count amongst them the following: Aldous Huxley and Adam Smith (Balliol College), Albert Einstein (Christ Church), Tony Blair (St. John’s), Margaret Thatcher and Indira Gandhi (Sommerville), Rupert Murdoch (Worcester), JRR Tolkien and Richard Burton (Exeter), Bill Clinton (University College), Christopher Wren (Wadham), TS Eliot (Merton), TE Lawrence (Jesus), Oscar Wilde (Magdalen, pronounced “maudlin”), John Le Carre (Lincoln), Jonathan Swift (Hertford), Aung San Suu Kyi (St. Hughes), Hugh Grant (New College), and Rowan Atkinson (Queen’s).

A Cambridge graduate is called Cantabrigian and one refers to Cambridge as Cantab (Oxford is Oxon). Famous graduates include: Oliver Cromwell (Sidney Sussex College), John Milton and Charles Darwin (Christ’s), Alan Turing and John Maynard Keynes (King’s), David Attenborough (Clare), Stephen Hawking (Trinity Hall), Emma Thompson (Newham), Tom Hiddleston (Pembroke), Stephen Fry (Queen’s), Hugh Laurie (Selwyn), Ian McKellen and Richard Ayoade (St. Catherine’s), and Prince Charles, AA Milne, and Isaac Newton (Trinity).

Oh, and the Cambridge Five: John Cairncross, Guy Burgess, Anthony Blunt, Kim Philby (Trinity), and Donald Maclean (Trinity Hall).

There’s also the Cambridge Footlights.

Cambridge, of course, is the superior university, as proven by the following:

• 121 Nobel Prizes have been awarded to people associated with Cambridge University (29 of those are in physics). By comparison, Oxford has a measly 72.

• Cambridge is the birthplace of football! The 1863 “Cambridge Rules” included things such as no carrying the ball, no “hacking” (kicking the shins) and no loitering between “the ball and the adversaries’ goal” — an early version of the offside rule.

• Understandably miffed that students couldn’t keep dogs in their rooms, it was reported that the poet Lord Byron kept a bear in his room instead!

• Cambridge’s original name was Grantabrycge.

• In more recent times, the city has become known as Silicon Fen because of its reputation and influence amongst the technology industry. Up to 3,000 tech and science businesses are based here.

• Here’s a weird one: Oliver Cromwell’s head is buried in a secret location there.

(From “A Short History of Cambridge”).

Another thing: confirmation is had that one is truly a Cantabrigian the moment a desperately confused tourist comes up to you and asks “where is Cambridge University?” and you reply (smugly? smilingly? best both.) “you’re in it.” Because the entire town is the University. It is not found in a compound. It’s also a good example of a category mistake fallacy.

Oxbridge tends to accept around 18% of applicants. At first glance this looks ironically more generous than other universities, but the truth is that Oxbridge requires you to pass minimum requirements first before allowing you to apply and before your application even considered. And you can only apply either to Oxford or Cambridge but not both.

Cambridge’s undergraduate Law program, for one, sees around 1,600 applicants every year, with only around 280 accepted. If memory serves, in the 1990s, the acceptance rate was around 10%. International law is a Cambridge thing, what with Rosalyn Higgins (Girton), Robert Jennings (Downing), and Elihu Lauterpacht (Kings). James Crawford was formerly the director of the Lauterpacht Centre for International Law.

So, does one learn a lot from Oxbridge? Speaking only of Cambridge, surely. Or rather in all probability. I spent much of my time in The Eagle so one can only guess. Anyway, in the words of Andrew Wiles (Clare College) in closing his Cambridge lecture solving Fermat’s Last Theorem: I think I’ll stop here.

 

Jemy Gatdula is a senior fellow of the Philippine Council for Foreign Relations and a Philippine Judicial Academy law lecturer for constitutional philosophy and jurisprudence

https://www.facebook.com/jigatdula/

Twitter @jemygatdula

Tropang Giga go for the clincher

THE TnT Tropang Giga go for the jugular and claim the PBA Philippine Cup title when they trek back to action on Friday for Game Five of the best-of-seven finals series against the Magnolia Hotshots. — PBA IMAGES

By Michael Angelo S. Murillo, Senior Reporter

THE TnT Tropang Giga go for the jugular and claim the PBA Philippine Cup title when they trek back to action on Friday for Game Five of the best-of-seven finals series at the Don Honorio Ventura State University Gym in Bacolor, Pampanga.

Currently holding a commanding 3-1 series lead over the Magnolia Pambansang Manok Hotshots after taking Game Four, 106-89, on Wednesday, TnT now seeks to close out the proceedings and return to being Philippine Basketball Association (PBA) after six years.

The Tropang Giga put themselves in great position to win the title of the ongoing All-Filipino tournament with a steady performance on both ends last time around.

They used an explosive second quarter where they outscored the Hotshots, 33-15, to build a considerable lead, 57-39, at the break, and never relinquished control en route to the victory.

Rookie Mikey Williams took charge again for TnT in the Game Four victory, scoring a team-high 26 points and going 6-of-11 from beyond the arc.

Veterans Jayson Castro and Ryan Reyes also provided ample support from the bench as the team continuously fended off any comeback Magnolia tried to make.

Forward Troy Rosario showed tremendous heart despite nursing an injured finger and back. The athletic forward started the game which he was expected to miss after failing to finish Game Three following a hard fall.

Mr. Rosario played 19 minutes in Game Four, finishing with five points, two rebounds and a block.

TnT coach Chot Reyes lauded the collective effort that his wards put up to make the victory possible, including that of Mr. Rosario.

“Our team doesn’t have a first group or a second group. We just have 15 guys and everyone, when asked to come in to play, is accountable to be able to deliver. Anyone can start and anyone can play off the bench, it doesn’t matter. That’s our team,” Mr. Reyes said in the post-game press conference.

“Shout out to Troy. He should not be playing. The reason we played him was for inspirational purposes. You see he couldn’t even catch the ball, but he wanted to try to play. The message of courage rubbed off on his teammates. It’s a great heart shown by Troy, then everything followed,” he added.

TnT is seeking its sixth All-Filipino title and eighth PBA crown in franchise history. It was last a champion in 2015 with the Commissioner’s Cup.

For Magnolia, it will try to extend the series further and sweep the remaining games of the series.

In Game Four, best player of the conference winner Calvin Abueva tried to tow the Hotshots to the win with 28 points, but they just could not get the leverage they were angling for to fashion out a comeback.

Ian Sangalang had a double-double of 17 points and 10 rebounds while Paul Lee had 15.

Magnolia is in search of Philippine Cup title number seven and 15th league championship. The Hotshots’ most recent title was the 2018 Governors’ Cup.

Game Five of the PBA Philippine Cup finals is set for 6 p.m.

Houston Astros bounce back behind Jose Urquidy, level World Series 1-1

THE Houston Astros have been here before, operating on this stage so many times of late, that when they needed a clutch World Series performance in Game 2 on Wednesday, a steady and measured level of play appeared to come naturally.

Jose Altuve hit a home run and right-hander Jose Urquidy went five strong innings as Houston earned a 7-2 victory over the visiting Atlanta to even the World Series one win apiece.

The Astros maximized their opportunities, scoring four of their runs on a sacrifice fly, an infield single, an error and a fielder’s choice to rebound from a 6-2 defeat in Game 1.

Down one-game-to-none in the World Series is hardly a foreign concept to the Astros. It happened to them in 2017 against the Los Angeles Dodgers, when they won the title, and again in 2019, when they were defeated by the Washington Nationals. Both series went seven games.

“After we lost (in Game 1), we stayed positive,” Altuve said postgame on Major League Baseball (MLB) Network. “That’s something we always talk about is win (today). We don’t care about yesterday or what we did. It was a new game today. I think we started the game the right way, and I was happy that we won this one. We needed it.”

The best-of-seven series shifts to Atlanta for the next three games Friday, Saturday and Sunday.

Travis d’Arnaud homered for the Braves while starter Max Fried gave up six runs on seven hits over five-plus innings as Atlanta lost for the third time in its past five postseason road games.

The Astros have won four of their past five overall and have rebounded with a victory following three of their four postseason losses.

“I just think we did a great job of communicating in the dugout,” said the Astros’ Michael Brantley, who matched Altuve with a pair of hits. “We haven’t faced (Fried) before. We have a lot of respect for him; he’s a great pitcher. We just did a great job of communicating, staying in the zone and having quality at-bats.”

Houston got off to a fast start with Altuve leading off the bottom of the first inning with a double before moving to third base on a Brantley fly ball. Alex Bregman followed with a sacrifice fly for a 1-0 lead.

The Braves got d’Arnaud’s solo home run in the second inning before trouble surfaced. The Astros scored four runs in the second, the first on an infield single from Jose Siri. Martin Maldonado added a run on a single to left field, with Siri scoring from first base on the play when Atlanta left fielder Eddie Rosario fired an errant throw back to the infield.

Houston finished off the big rally on a Brantley RBI single for a 5-1 advantage.

“In those moments, you try to slow the game down to try and get out of it,” Fried said, referencing a slow walk he took around the mound as the second inning was unfolding. “You want to be able to slow things down and shift the momentum. Sometimes, you have to take a longer time to settle things down.”

The Braves pulled within 5-2 on a Freddie Freeman RBI single in the fifth inning. The Astros got the run back in the sixth on a Yuli Gurriel ground ball that scored Yordan Alvarez as the Braves failed to record an out on the play.

Altuve’s home run led off the bottom of the seventh, his fourth this postseason. He has 22 playoff homers in his career, tied with Bernie Williams for second in major league history.

Urquidy (1-0) gave up two runs on six hits with no walks and seven strikeouts. Four Astros relievers combined to allow one hit over four scoreless innings. “I was really focused, throwing strikes and attacking the hitters all the time, attacking the strike zone” said Urquidy, who rebounded from a rough start in Game 3 of the American League Championship Series (ALCS) against the Boston Red Sox when he gave up six runs (five earned) in 1 2/3 innings. “The offense and defense was very good tonight.”

Fried (0-1) walked one and struck out six in his second consecutive rough outing. He gave up five runs in 4 2/3 innings during a defeat against the Los Angeles Dodgers in Game 5 of the National League Championship Series (NLCS).

“I can’t wait to get back home,” d’Arnaud said. “They’re really going to bring it. We have some great fans, and I know they will be ready to turn it on when we get back home.” — Reuters

Diaz making sure fruits of hard work do not go to waste

Filipino Olympic gold medalist Hidilyn Diaz

PHILIPPINE sports history is littered with athletes who made hay and earned a lot in their prime, but wound up with little, or worse, nothing to show for when their careers were all said and done.

It is this kind of predicament that Olympic gold medalist and top weightlifter Hidilyn F. Diaz wants to avoid and for fellow athletes and other people to learn from.

“I’ve seen so many athletes who after their careers didn’t have anything to turn to. They focused more on their ‘wants’ and not on their ‘needs,’ which is really sad. I don’t want that to happen to me and to the current and future athletes,” said Ms. Diaz, 30, in a press conference hosted by BDO Unibank on Wednesday where she was introduced as the bank’s new brand ambassador.

She went on to share that she has put in a lot in her chosen path as an athlete and does not want them to go to waste.

“There is still life after sports and we have to be ready for it. Whatever we are getting right now, we have to use it properly in preparation for the future not only for ourselves, but also for our loved ones,” she said.

Ms. Diaz received a huge windfall both from the government and private sector for making history by winning the country’s first-ever Olympic gold medal at the Tokyo Games this year.

Such blessings only further underscored for her the need to be financially responsible with her earnings, something she admitted to be doing with help from like-minded people and organizations like BDO.

“The worst investment as an athlete is to be with people who don’t share the same goal as you. It will be a waste of time,” said Ms. Diaz, who is a Business Management student at the College of Saint Benilde.

“It’s important to establish a good relationship and trust with people and organizations who can help us make sound decisions in terms of our finances, like where to invest our hard-earned money and provide services that we could use that suit our needs. It is something I found in BDO,” she added.

Apart from the weightlifting gym she put up in Zamboanga City where she hopes to produce future medalists in the sport, Ms. Diaz has plans of setting up different businesses, like restaurants and a café, saying “I’m dreaming big.”

She is also studying investing in stocks and bonds with help from a financial adviser.

“My journey as an athlete started as a dream. I just went for it. So I encourage others to dream high as well, but also be discerning on their choices and decisions, including financially,” Ms. Diaz said.

“In our case, we will not be forever athletes. So we have to invest in our future as well so that we can reap the fruits of our hard work the best way possible.” — Michael Angelo S. Murillo

Philippines to play in Group B of AFC Women’s Asian Cup

The Philippine women’s national football team will play in Group B of the AFC Women’s Asian Cup India 2022 happening in January. — PFF

The Philippine women’s national football team will play in Group B of the AFC Women’s Asian Cup India 2022 happening in January.

The groupings were known following the official draw on Thursday in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

The national team is lumped along with Australia, Thailand and Indonesia where it hopes to go deep in the tournament and vie for an historic FIFA World Cup qualification in 2023.

Former Australia coach Alen Stajcic will steer the Philippine women’s team in the Asian Cup after being named early this week.

He replaced Marlon Maro at the helm and will be turning to his vast experience in international play, which includes a five-year stint with the “Matildas,” the moniker of the Australian squad, that saw them qualify for  the 2015 and 2019 FIFA Women’s World Cup and the Rio 2016 Summer Olympics, where the team reached the quarterfinals.

Joining Mr. Stajcic is assistant coach Nahuel Arrarte.

The Philippine Football Federation is currently in the process of finalizing the team’s preparation for the Asian Cup that will see it hold tryouts and training in California beginning November.

The other groupings, meanwhile, have India, China, Chinese Taipei and Iran in Group A and defending champion Japan, Korea, Vietnam and Myanmar in Group C.

The AFC Asian Cup format calls for the top two countries from each of the three groups making the last eight together with the two best-ranked third placed teams. – Michael Angelo S. Murillo

300 coaches benefit from PSC’s sports-specific lectures

About 300 participants received online sports-specific lectures on athletics, badminton and volleyball in the Philippine Sports Commission’s National Sports Coaching Certification Course (NSCCC) on Thursday.

A project under the Philippine Sports Institute’s (PSI) Sports Education and Training Program, the NSCCC aims to provide an opportunity for continued learning and skill building for coaches as part of a unified national grassroots sports program in the country.

“We wanted to elevate the learning experience of these participants, who previously passed the Level 1 Sports Science Lectures conducted from July 2020 to June last month,” said PSI Grassroots Program Head Abby Rivera.

The two-day lectures for athletics, badminton, and volleyball were simultaneously opened by PSC Commissioners Ramon Fernandez, Celia Kiram, and Charles Maxey, respectively, via Google Meet. The program will be concluded with an examination on Saturday.

The PSC-PSI also tapped on the expertise of Coach Roselyn Jamero and Coach Joseph Sy (athletics), Coach Bianca Carlos and Coach Rjay Ormilla (badminton), and Coach Jerry Yee (volleyball), to give high-quality lectures through synchronous and asynchronous learning methods.

Ms. Rivera added that, “passers to be granted Level 1 accreditation on these sports specific lectures will be moving on to Level 2.”

Last February, a total of 180 participants from various cities and municipalities from Luzon also received Level 1 Sports Science online lectures on Sports Philosophy, Sports Pedagogy, Sports Psychology, Sports Physiology, Talent Identification, and Sports Ethics.

1...6,4486,4496,450...13,392Page 6,449 of 13,392
© 2024 BusinessWorld Publishing.
All rights reserved.
Read our privacy guidelines
Facebook Instagram Linkedin Twitter Youtube