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Welcome to Nikkei Asian
Preview, a list of the most important business,
economic and political
events happening in Asia each week.
Here's what we're watching:
MONDAY
Bolsonaro wraps India
trip
Brazil's controversial President Jair Bolsonaro ends his four-day trip to
India, a fellow BRICs member. Over the weekend, Bolsonaro attended
India's 71st Republic Day Parade as Prime Minister Narendra Modi's
guest
of honor, an unusually warm welcome for the Latin American
leader who has
been shunned for racist and sexist rhetoric.
Outside the presidential palace, demonstrators called for Bolsonaro
to
"go back." Among them were sugar farmers protesting a
World
Trade Organization investigation on India's sugar subsidies
initiated by
Brazil, and human rights activists demanding justice
for their Brazilian
peer Marielle Franco, who was assassinated in 2018.
The two premiers, both from the strongman school of leadership, also
held
high-level talks in New Delhi to enhance bilateral cooperation on
energy
and trade.
TUESDAY
Maruti Suzuki results
Is the worst of India's car slump over? The country's top-selling
c
armaker Maruti Suzuki India,
majority owned by Japan's Suzuki Motor,
will give some clues today when
it releases third-quarter earnings. India 's automobile industry is
struggling to recover from its worst-ever downturn
in 2019, which forced
companies to cut production and slash tens of
thousands of jobs.
WEDNESDAY
Apple results
After its stock price more than doubled within a year -- rising more
than
30% in the past three months alone -- Apple is expected to
report
first-quarter results for the fiscal year 2020 on Tuesday at 2 p.m.
PST
(Wednesday at 7 a.m. JST).
Analysts and investors are closely watching if the U.S. smartphone
maker
can live up to bullish expectations of iPhone 11s sales.
The growth may
be driven by smartphone sales in the China
market and the services and
wearable sectors, as Apple tries
to diversify revenue stream to become
less iPhone-dependent.
THURSDAY
Coronavirus hurts
Chinese travel
Just how much the Wuhan virus
scare has affected the world's
biggest annual travel season
should become clear on Thursday,
when Chinese officials will publish
estimates of how many
domestic and international trips citizens took over
the Lunar
New Year holiday -- and how much they spent.
In early January, authorities had projected citizens would take
440
million train trips and about 79 million plane trips
-- but that was
before transport links with the hard-hit city of
Wuhan were cut last
week.
On the same day, top executives of Las Vegas Sands, which
holds the
largest market share among casino operators in Macao,
the world's busiest
gambling hub, are due to give a
quarterly update. Analysts will be
listening for word on how
much the virus is dampening action at the
tables in Macao,
which has already confirmed cases of viral infection
among
travelers arriving from Wuhan.
Samsung and Naver 4Q
earnings
South Korea's tech giant Samsung Electronics and internet company
Naver will announce fourth-quarter
earnings on Thursday.
Samsung suffered from a downturn in semiconductor
business in 2019, but
analysts say it may rebound this year
as memory chip prices have hit
bottom. Whether Vice Chairman
Lee Jae-yong will be arrested again on
charges of bribery is
another issue weighing on the company.
Background: Can Samsung stay on course?
Analysts will be listening for updates on Naver's plan to set up a
joint
venture between its Japanese subsidiary Line and SoftBank
Group's Yahoo
Japan. The venture would create a digital payment
s challenger to Google, Alibaba
and Tencent. But Naver is already
in the crosshairs of Seoul's antitrust regulator.
FRIDAY
China reports monthly
PMI
China appears set to report upbeat numbers in its official monthly
manufacturing purchasing managers' index. Year-end GDP figures
released
earlier this month and the signing of U.S.-China
"phase one"
trade deal have led economists to nudge their
expectations for economic
growth higher on signs of a
nascent recovery in industrial activity. But
the
Lunar New Year break and spreading worries about
the Wuhan virus may
weigh on respondents' sentiment.
SK Hynix and LG
Display 4Q earnings
More fourth quarter earnings will come from South Korean
chipmaker SK Hynix and panel maker LG Display on Friday.
Like Samsung, SK Hynix bore the brunt of memory chip woes in 2019,
but
expects a turnaround this year. Meanwhile, LG Display is
embarking on a
transformation of its business structure to
focus on high-tech OLED,
after Chinese players caught up
on cheap LCD technology.
Brexit kicks in
The United Kingdom on Friday will finalize its divorce from the
European
Union. When Prime Minister Boris Johnson gets
past the pomp and ceremony
of the occasion, he will have
some big calls to make. Johnson will be
free to negotiate a
trade deal with the European bloc, as well as with
the
U.S., China, Japan and a host of potential partners.
Why it matters to business: Perhaps Johnson's first call will be
whether to allow Huawei to participate in building
Britain's 5G network. While Johnson himself asked earlier this
month "What's the alternative?," he's under pressure from
U.S.
President Donald Trump to ditch the Chinese tech giant ove
r national
security concerns. Washington has threatened to
end intelligence sharing
if London proceeds with Huawei.
Why it matters to Asia: Japanese and other companies across
Asia are
watching carefully to see what kind of deal the U.K.
can strike with the
EU, as it directly impacts investment in Britain.
WEEKEND
India budget
announcement and economic survey
India's budget for the financial year starting in April will
be announced
on Saturday. An economic slowdown has put
pressure on the government of
Prime Minister Narendra Modi
to take immediate steps to stimulate demand.
A day prior, the Finance Ministry will table in Parliament
its annual
Economic Survey, providing a detailed account
of the state of the Indian
economy.
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