SINGAPORE, Oct 25 (Reuters) - The Financial Times and the
Wall Street Journal carried the following stories in their Asia
print and/or Web site editions on Thursday.
Reuters has not verified these stories and does not vouch for
their accuracy.
FINANCIAL TIMES (www.ft.com)
-- Merrill Lynch <MER.N> sparked fear that Wall Street could
face further heavy losses from credit market turmoil, revealing
$7.9bn in writedowns on mortgage-related securities during the
third quarter.
-- Warren Buffett urged investors on Wednesday to be cautious
about the Chinese stock market, which has risen nearly sixfold in
the past two years. Speaking on a visit to Dalian in north-east
China, Mr Buffett said he was always sceptical about markets that
had risen as sharply as Chinese shares have.
-- Microsoft <MSFT.O> on Wednesday took a $240 million stake
in Facebook, the online social network, a move that puts a value
on the site, which has yet to make a profit, of $15 billion. The
software group has also beaten Google <GOOG.O> to striking a key
advertising deal.
-- Japan's Financial Services Agency signalled a shift
towards a more UK-style principles-based regulatory model on
Wednesday, to strengthen the country?s competitiveness as a
financial centre.
-- Alibaba.com has attracted more than $100 billion in orders
from institutional investors for its planned $1.5 billion capital
raising, reflecting keen demand for one of Hong Kong's hottest
offerings this year.
-- Hank Paulson, the U.S. Treasury Secretary, on Wednesday
threw his weight behind plans to turn Mumbai into an
international financial centre in a speech ahead of his first
official visit to India later this week.
-- Australia's prime minister, John Howard, suffered a
further blow in his faltering re-election campaign on Wednesday
with the release of worse-than-expected inflation figures that
make an election-eve interest rate rise a near certainty.
WALL STREET JOURNAL (www.wsj.com)
-- TPG is investing in pharmaceutical-research-outsourcing
company Shanghai ChemPartner, according to people familiar with
the deal, underscoring the industry's growing importance as it
effectively rents out Chinese scientists to multi-national drug
companies.
-- China launched its first lunar probe, the initial step in
an ambitious 10-year plan to send a rover to the moon and return
it to earth.
-- PetroChina Co. <0857.HK> set an indicative price range of
15 yuan to 16.70 yuan ($2 to $2.23) a share for its initial
public offering of Class A stock, which could raise as much as
66.8 billion yuan, or about $8.9 billion.
-- China Southern Airlines Co.'s <1055.HK> net profit rose
49 percent in the third quarter as China's economic expansion
helped boost passenger numbers. The Guangzhou-based carrier said
net profit rose to 1.88 billion yuan ($250.5 million) from 1.26
billion yuan a year earlier, according to Chinese accounting
rules.
-- IHG <IHG.L> unveiled a $1 billion revamp of its Holiday
Inn brand encompassing over 3,000 hotels, including 100 in Asia.
-- Zhong An Real Estate set a price range for its Hong Kong
IPO of shares that could raise up to $500 million.
-- Morgan Stanley <MS.N> agreed to buy a 35 percent stake in
China's Jutian Fund Management, giving the Wall Street bank
access to the country's rapidly growing fund-management sector.
-- A U.S. official said China has slowed cooperation with the
U.S. on fighting product piracy since Washington complained to
the WTO on the issue earlier this year.
((Compiled by Asia Desk, +65 6870-3821))