Your daily market briefing

Japan sees slower inflow of foreign professionals as AI crimps hiring

Kioxia-linked cloud startup to make it easier to crunch encrypted data

Shake-up at Japan nuclear plant operator after quake data scandal

MediaTek says new AI phone chip reduces memory use amid supply crunch

Thailand and Cambodia begin UN-backed conciliation over maritime claims

Australian tungsten miner joins US efforts to rebuild supply chain

Gold bars increasingly used in scams in Japan The Japan Times

Japan Eyes Defense Spending at 3.5% of GDP After US Pressure

Analysis-Yen rally faces moment of truth as BOJ risks disappointing markets

Japan's JFE Engineering, startups bet on Philippine renewable energy

Grab to buy Singapore-based Atome Financial for $1.49bn to boost consumer lending

The reshaping of global trade as EU, China and US shift to enforcement

Nagoya University-linked startup regenerates Thai soil with microbes

Japan consumers boost in-game purchases despite inflation squeeze

Japan trading house lobby chief urges stronger yen despite sector windfall

SoftBank-Backed SB Energy's IPO Seeks $500 Million in Japan

Gold Bars Increasingly Used in Scams in Japan nippon.com

The average retail price of pork loin this month came to ¥293 per 100 grams, hitting the highest level since the survey began in August 2003.

Standard Chartered’s Chong Hoon Park and Nicholas Chia expect the Bank of Japan (BoJ) to deliver a 25bps rate hike in September but maintain a gradual normalisation path.

Investors are looking out for alternative currencies to borrow in to buy higher-yielding assets following the Japanese currency's recent rise.

Kioxia is planning the share sale at a time when concerns about the pace of artificial intelligence development are escalating.

Four Republican senators joined Democrats in voting against the legislation, which was backed by President Donald Trump.

Japan's Cash-Strapped Monks Pushed to Invest as Inflation Worsens

Dollar rises as Middle East conflict lifts oil, Fed hike looms Dollar gains as Middle East conflict lifts oil, Fed hike looms CNBC

Japan's LNG demand stymies response after Putin's disputed-island visit Nikkei Asia

Japan likely sold Treasuries to fund record yen intervention equiti.com

Dollar rises as Middle East conflict lifts oil, Fed hike looms Reuters

Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney said Tuesday that Canada intends to emerge from its trade war with the United States as a more resilient and independent economy, signaling…

TOYO Corporation Opens Quantum Computers to Japan’s Growing Technology Ecosystem World Business Outlook

Japan Real Estate Developers Boosting Data Center Projects The Japan News

Clued-in | U.S. drains Japan's economy, and Japanese people are paying the price People's Daily Online

George W. Bush was president. The Euro currency had just gone into circulation. Tom Brady was coming off the first of his seven Super Bowl titles. And Ronaldo…

Japan's Chubu Electric Halts Plans for Nuclear Restart

Japan FSA to examine real estate lending risks as rates climb The Japan Times

[International] : Anchor: A recent drone attack shutting down a key Saudi oil pipeline has compounded global energy shortages triggered by the blocked Strait of Hormuz. This disruption directly threatens South Korea, which relies on Saudi Arabia for one-third of its crude imports, driving up market anxiety amid dwindling ...[more...]

Software company Hancom plans to launch Nomadian, an artificial intelligence (AI) workforce platform that allows solo entrepreneurs to assemble teams of task-specific AI agents, targeting the U.S. market with a beta release planned for December. Hancom said Tuesday it has formed a dedicated task force to develop the web-based platform, which will be offered on a software-as-a-service (SaaS) basis, with a full subscription service planned for 2027 following the beta release. Nomadian is designed primarily for the growing number of solo entrepreneurs and small businesses in the United States, allowing users to hire AI agents for roles such as data analysis, content marketing and email marketing, and connect them to the tools they need. Users will be able to issue a task in a single sentence, prompting the platform to break it down into smaller tasks and assign them to appropriate AI agents, while they can also create custom agents for roles that are unavailable. The agents can produce documents, spreadsheets and presentations. The agents' work is displayed in a 3D virtual office, allowing

Hyundai Motor’s autonomous driving road map is putting its ability to keep pace with Tesla under scrutiny, as the U.S. automaker rapidly gains stronger ground in Korea’s electric vehicle (EV) market. Last week, Hyundai Motor Group’s self-driving arm — 42dot — said it will introduce cars with Level 2+ autonomous driving technology based on Nvidia’s platform in the first half of 2028, followed by Level 2++ technology later that year. Vehicles equipped with the carmaker’s proprietary Atria artificial intelligence (AI) system will also be mass-produced in the second half of 2029, according to 42dot. Under the road map, the automaker seeks to close the gap with Tesla and other overseas autonomous driving leaders. But the timeline for Hyundai Motor's self-driving commercialization still leaves much to be desired, as Tesla has already turned into a consumer-facing product. Tesla’s Full Self-Driving (FSD) Supervised system is already available in Korea in limited form, although regulatory approval for its broader domestic operation remains a key hurdle. Tesla has also been expand

Global X, the New York-based provider of exchange-traded funds (ETFs), announced Tuesday the launch of a new fund that seeks to invest in the manufacturers of multilayer ceramic capacitors (MLCCs) and related components. A key building block of many modern electronic devices, MLCCs are used in artificial intelligence (AI) servers, electric vehicles, smartphones and other items. Roughly 85 percent of the global MLCC industry is controlled by five manufacturers based in Japan, Korea and Taiwan. The Global X MLCC & Electronic Components ETF provides exposure to all of these companies, which can be difficult for U.S. investors to access directly. Its portfolio includes Murata Manufacturing, Samsung Electro-Mechanics, Yageo Corp., TDK Corp. and many others. "The manufacturers of these components sit at a genuine chokepoint in the AI supply chain and could be difficult to access directly through U.S.-listed shares," said Pedro Palandrani, head of product research & development at Global X. Global X has long been known for thematic ETFs, including innovations such as its AI and technology ETF,

A high-level delegation from the Abu Dhabi Chamber of Commerce and Industry (ADCCI) is visiting Korea from Sept. 15-17, as part of the emirate's continuing effort to strengthen ties with major trading partners and economies. The visit builds on the special strategic partnership between Korea and the United Arab Emirates established in 2018, with the delegation set to explore expanded cooperation in artificial intelligence (AI), advanced manufacturing, energy, water resources, health care, education, space and agricultural technology. More than 88 public and private organizations are represented in the delegation, including the Abu Dhabi Department of Economic Development (ADDED), Abu Dhabi Global Market (ADGM), the Abu Dhabi Investment Office (ADIO), Abu Dhabi Customs, Hub71, Abu Dhabi Police, Sheikh Shakhbout Medical City, Khalifa Economic Zones Abu Dhabi, Emirates Global Aluminium, Etihad Airways, Masdar City, Core42 and financial services and investment banking platform Al Liwan. Shamis Ali Khalfan Al Dhaheri, chairman of the Abu Dhabi Department of Community Development and second v

SK Telecom said it signed a partnership with global security company F5 to expand cooperation on artificial intelligence (AI) cloud security, aimed at strengthening the carrier's ability to defend against web and API attacks as well as distributed denial-of-service (DDoS) and bot attacks. Under the deal, SK Telecom will act as both a value-added reseller, which resells F5 products with added services or technology, and a managed service provider, which uses F5 products to deliver managed IT services to customers — making it F5's first domestic managed service partner for its software-as-a-service security platform. F5, headquartered in Seattle, is a global leader in multicloud application and API security, providing solutions to more than 90 percent of Fortune 500 companies. Its software-as-a-service-based security platform, F5 Distributed Cloud, helps companies protect applications and APIs across multicloud environments as part of their digital transformation. SK Telecom said the partnership responds to the rapidly growing AI market and tightening security regulations. The market fo

Hyosung Heavy Industries has secured 386.5 billion won ($277 million) worth of ultra-high-voltage transformer orders from two major U.S. Big Tech companies this month, strengthening its position as a key power infrastructure supplier amid the rapid expansion of artificial intelligence (AI) data centers. The company said Tuesday that the transformers will be installed at newly built AI data centers in the northern and southern United States. The orders include 220 billion won worth of 765-kilovolt transformers and 166.5 billion won worth of 345-kilovolt transformers. The equipment will supply electricity to power-intensive data center facilities. The latest deals reflect Hyosung Chairman Cho Hyun-joon’s yearslong efforts to establish a local production and solutions network in the U.S. Cho has described the surge in demand for power infrastructure as a “once-in-60-years supercycle” driven by AI. He has set a goal of making Hyosung Heavy Industries one of the world’s top three power equipment companies within five years by offering a broad portfolio ranging from transformers and ci

Samsung SDS has become the first Korean company to earn Select-tier status in Anthropic’s Claude Partner Network (CPN), strengthening its ability to help businesses adopt and operate Claude-based artificial intelligence (AI) services. The designation comes about two months after the company signed a strategic partnership with the U.S. firm in July at an AI summit in San Francisco to expand enterprise AI business opportunities in Korea. The CPN’s Select tier recognizes partners with certified technical expertise and experience deploying Claude-based solutions in customers’ production environments. Samsung SDS said the new status strengthens its end-to-end AI adoption framework, covering consulting on Claude deployment, access to the model through Amazon Web Services’ (AWS) Amazon Bedrock platform, service implementation and operations and ongoing technical support. “By combining Anthropic's frontier AI technology with Samsung SDS's digital transformation expertise across industries, we will accelerate domestic companies’ AI adoption and help create tangible business value,”

Korean cybersecurity firm Ahnlab said Wednesday it plans to invest 100 billion won ($73.14 million) over the next three years in an effort to restructure its business around subscription-based services. Such plans were announced at a press conference in Seoul as it vowed to transform the company into an "artificial intelligence native" cybersecurity firm. According to the company, the investments will focus on building artificial intelligence (AI) infrastructure, as well as improving its research and development capabilities and attracting AI-related talent. Building on this, the company also plans to triple its sales from 300 billion won this year to 1 trillion won by 2035, Ahnlab's Chief Executive Officer (CEO) Kang Suk-kyoon explained. "We need to grow by an average of 15 percent every year to attain that goal, but given our growth trend, we think such a goal is achievable," he said, noting the company could consider carrying out merger and acquisition deals or new investments to scale up. Ahnlab also plans to expand its overseas sales to 30 percent by 2035 from the current 10 percent

For GS, building AI data centers is becoming less about finding more power and more about finding what comes next, gathering seven startups Tuesday to pitch technologies spanning electricity, memory, cooling and computing. GS Ventures held its 2026 Tech Day at GS Tower in Gangnam, Seoul, bringing together six companies in its investment portfolio and one additional startup focused on artificial intelligence (AI) data center technologies. Executives from GS Energy, GS Caltex, GS E&C, GS E&R and GS Global attended, along with representatives of participating startups. The companies presented technologies covering much of the infrastructure needed to keep AI data centers running, from stable power supplies to graphics processing unit (GPU) cloud operations. Synergy introduced a hydrogen fuel cell solution for data centers, drawing on technology developed for ships and maritime transportation, while Exina presented intelligent memory based on Compute Express Link, or CXL, designed to ease data-processing bottlenecks. CoolMicro and SDT presented liquid-cooling systems, with one using direct-to

Choi Jae-boong, professor of interdisciplinary AI service design at Sungkyunkwan University, said education in the era of artificial intelligence (AI) should focus on cultivating humanity, while universities should move away from simply trying to restrict students’ use of AI and instead rethink how their curricula are designed. Choi shared such visions during his keynote speech at the 2026 Korea Times Global Conference at Korea Chamber of Commerce and Industry building in Seoul, Tuesday. Under the theme of “Beyond AI: building human-centered leadership for the next era,” he stressed that AI innovation is an inevitable future and that both leadership and education must undergo a fundamental shift to prepare for it. “Many Big Tech companies carried out layoffs over the past several years, but when I looked at their headcounts again earlier this year, they had increased because the companies were hiring more AI talent,” Choi said. “However, the focus of Korean universities last year and even this year was how to prevent students from using AI to do their assignments. Almost no

Saudi pipeline strike raises alarm over Korea’s crude oil supply Korea JoongAng Daily

KT, one of Korea's major telecommunications service providers, has joined forces with the Korea Institute of Science and Technology Information (KISTI) to open the nation's first 400-gigabit-per-second (Gbps) international dedicated circuit linking Korea and the United States, creating a faster route for massive research datasets. The circuit connects KISTI’s headquarters in Daejeon with Chicago, a major hub for research networks serving North America and Europe, KT said Wednesday. The new connection quadruples bandwidth from the previous 100 Gbps and is designed to support faster, more stable transfers for international scientific collaboration. Demand for cross-border data exchange has grown as research involving artificial intelligence (AI), large-scale science and astronomy increasingly depends on vast volumes of data, KT said. The new network is expected to accelerate transfers of large research datasets, strengthen global connectivity for Korea’s national research network and expand support for international collaborative research. KT and KISTI also completed technical tests aim

[Economy] : The government and local refiners say they expect the closure of Saudi Arabia’s East-West oil pipeline to have a limited short-term impact on domestic crude oil supplies, with more than 90 percent of September-October needs already secured. The Ministry of Trade, Industry and Resources on Monday held an ...[more...]

SEOUL, Sept. 15 (Yonhap) -- South Korea and Kazakhstan agreed Tuesday to elevate...

Inflation has thinned consumers’ wallets, yet budget and midrange smartphones are losing ground just when buyers need affordable options most. Soaring component costs, particularly for memory chips, are making it harder for manufacturers to sustain a low-margin, high-volume business model. As manufacturers focus on expanding their premium foldable phone lineups, consumers are increasingly turning to repairs and secondhand devices. iPhone 17e surpasses 1 million won Rising prices for budget and midrange smartphones are putting further pressure on consumers. According to smartphone industry observers Monday, Apple raised the price of its entry-level iPhone 17e, released in March, by 16.1 percent on Thursday, from 990,000 won ($726) to 1.15 million won. The company repriced the existing model as it launched its new iPhone 18 series at substantially higher prices amid so-called “chipflation” driven by global chip shortages. Samsung Electronics has also raised prices for its entry-level Galaxy A series. The Galaxy A37, released in Korea in June, costs 598,400 won, up 19.8 percent from la