Six centres of excellence will be launched in the Eastern Economic Corridor (EEC) to equip students with knowledge of advanced technologies for the 10 industries targeted by the corridor, said EEC Office secretary-general Kanit Sangsubhan.
Each will focus on teaching one technology specialism, with a centre of automation and robotics, of logistics, of next generation automotives, of track systems, of aviation, and of tourism.
Recently the EEC authority joined with Mitsubishi Electric Factory Automation (Thailand) to set up an automation and robotics excellence centre, called the EEC Automation Park, at Burapha University in Chonburi.
“The EEC expects to see demand for more than 37,000 workers with automation and robotics skills in the next five years,” Khanit said.
The company’s managing director, Wichiene Ngamsukkarsemsri, said that students of Burapha University and 20 other educational institutes can use the facilities at the centre. This would create a vast network of personnel with automation and robotics skills, he added
Construction of the centre is 30 per cent complete and should be finished by the middle of next year.
The EEC stretches across the eastern seaboard provinces of Rayong, Chonburi and Chachoengsao.
Experts are advising investors to monitor the political rally on Saturday (September 19), because the direction Thailand’s stock index takes will depend very much on the severity of the situation.
Apichat Poobunjirdkul, Tisco Securities senior director for strategic analysis, said the domestic political situation has always had an effect on the Thai stock market.
He said that though government will not initially harm protesters, the result will depend on how far the protesters go.
“We don’t expect the index to fall below 1,250, and it even has the chance to rise beyond 1,300 if the protest wraps up quickly. However, there is a chance that the index will drop to 1,200 if the situation escalates or is prolonged,” he said.
“The student-led protest on Saturday and the House meeting on September 23-24 will have an impact on the direction the Thai stock market takes, while the US presidential election, US-China tensions and Brexit negotiations will cause market volatility over the next two months.”
He said he expects the index to move between 1,250 and 1,280, and is advising investors to buy stocks for investment as the current price-to-earnings ratio has risen to 16-17 times from 15-16 times at the end of last year. Hence, he believes the index will move between 1,281 and 1,297 in the fourth quarter of this year, and rise beyond 1,300 in the first quarter of 2021.
He also added that the Thai stock market is likely to face a Fibonacci retracement technical correction at 1,269.
“We recommend buying stocks that pay dividends of more than 4 per cent per year and whose profits will rise later in the year,” he added.
Therdsak Thaveeteeratham, executive vice president for research at Asia Plus Securities, said investors are closely monitoring the political situation and the index will probably fall below 1,270 if things escalate. However, he said, the index will move between 1,270 and 1,300 if the situation is not severe.
“Currently, there were two factors pressuring the index – local political unrest and the Covid-19 outbreak,” he said.
Meanwhile, Nuttachart Mekmasin, assistant managing director for Trinity Securities, said he does not think the Saturday rally will get out of hand, though protesters will continue pressuring the government.
“The Thai stock index will fluctuate in a narrow range if protesters continue pressuring the government peacefully, but it will fall sharply if the situation gets out of hand. Hence, this is the time to buy shares because listed companies’ performance is expected to improve next year,” he said.
He sees the index resistance level at 1,310 and the support line between 1,270 and 1,250, adding that the index movements will depend very much on whether or not the situation escalates.
He advised investors concerned about the political situation to purchase stocks that will escape the political impact and are not involved in country’s supply chain, such as food, electronics and rubber products produced for export.
The Stock Exchange of Thailand (SET) Index closed at 1,288.39 on Friday, up 3.99 points or 0.31 per cent. Total transactions amounted to Bt49.97 billion with an index high of 1,293.29 and a low of 1,280.43.
In the morning session, an analyst at Krungsri Securities expected the day’s index to fluctuate between 1,275 and 1,295 despite the oil price rising above US$40 per barrel.
“Student protesters’ rally tomorrow [Saturday] and the FTSE’s index rebalancing, which will be effective on Friday evening, will cause volatility in the SET,” he said.
The 10 stocks with the highest trade value today were BBL, CRC, PTT, TASCO, AOT, KBANK, BDMS, SCB, ADVANC and SCC.
As of 4.30pm, the price of oil rose by US$0.06 or 0.15 per cent to $41.03 per barrel, while gold rose by $13.50 or 0.69 per cent, to $1,963.40 per ounce.
Other Asian indices were on the rise:
Japan’s Nikkei Index closed at 23,360.30, up 40.93 points or 0.18 per cent.
China’s Shang Hai SE Composite Index closed at 3,338.09, up 67.65 points or 2.07 per cent, while Shenzhen SE Component Index closed at 13,245.09, up 229.90 points or 1.77 per cent.
Hong Kong’s Hang Seng Index closed at 24,455.41, up 114.56 points or 0.47 per cent.
South Korea’s KOSPI Index closed at 2,412.40, up 6.23 points or 0.26 per cent.
Taiwan’s TAIEX Index closed at 12,875.62, up 2.88 points or 0.022 per cent.
By The Washington Post · Ian Duncan · NATIONAL, BUSINESS, WORLD, TRANSPORTATION More than 2,000 family members of those killed when a Boeing 737 Max crashed in Ethiopia, filed formal opposition Thursday to technical fixes the Federal Aviation Administration has proposed for the plane, saying they still do not believe the aircraft will be safe.
“We believe that the FAA is more concerned with saving Boeing’s investment in the 737 MAX than it is on ensuring that the airplane is safe,” the family members wrote in response to a proposed FAA directive for operators of the plane.
The fixes focus on changes to a software system implicated in two crashes of the 737 Max that happened over at span of five months in 2018 and 2019. The system was designed to smooth the planes’ handling, but malfunctioned before the crashes, driving down the jets’ noses in a way the pilots were unable to overcome. A total of 346 people died in the two crashes and the Max fleet was grounded worldwide while Boeing developed a fix.
The relatives of people who died in the second crash, which happened shortly after the plane took off from Addis Ababa on March 10, 2019, wrote that updating the faulty software was insufficient.
“The FAA should reevaluate the airplane as a whole and only permit it to fly if the FAA is completely satisfied that the 737 MAX is not a danger,” they wrote.
The FAA did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The families submitted their comments the day after the House Transportation Committee issued a scathing report on the development of the Max by Boeing, its oversight by the FAA and their response in the months between the two crashes.
House investigators concluded that the crashes were the result of a “horrific culmination of a series of faulty technical assumptions by Boeing’s engineers, a lack of transparency on the part of Boeing’s management, and grossly insufficient oversight by the FAA.”
In their comments, the family members wrote that investigative findings showing missed opportunities to make the planes safer mean “the pain of our loss is compounded.”
Boeing engineers and test pilots flagged concerns inside the company about how the software system worked, concluding in one case that if pilots didn’t respond to a malfunction within 10 seconds, the outcome would be catastrophic.
“Boeing engineers identified the exact defect that would later cause the two crashes but decided that it was not necessary to change the design to eliminate the system’s risks,” the family members wrote.
The families called for a more thorough review of Max, including by an independent panel of experts, and the release of more data to the public before the plane is cleared to fly again.
The FAA is proposing to require software changes developed by Boeing that would curb the system and that it rely on data from two sensors instead of one.
The family members argue the changes only paper over an underlying issue with the plane’s aerodynamics. The software was included to counter changes in jet’s handling compared to previous models of 737, caused by the placement of the Max’s new engines.
“The software updates and revised procedures are no more than a mitigation strategy, because they fail to address the root cause of the problem,” they wrote.
An organization representing more than 10,000 British pilots filed comments Wednesday, echoing some of the families concerns. The group said in particular that it would prefer for the software system to receive data from three sensors, an approach used by European manufacturer Airbus.
The public has until Monday to comment on the FAA’s proposal. The agency will then review the comments before issuing a final directive requiring operators of the jets to make the fixes, a key step toward ungrounding the fleet.
But it remains unclear exactly when the Max might be approved to fly again.
An international group of regulators and crews has been meeting at London’s Gatwick Airport this week to evaluate training changes for Max pilots, and their feedback will be incorporated into a second document that the FAA will give the public the opportunity to comment on.
The FAA has repeatedly said that it is not following a specific timeline but is focused on thoroughly reviewing the Max.
Thai e-vehicle mogul urges launch of Bt2tn energy fund
CorporateSep 18. 2020Somphote Ahunai, CEO of Energy Absolute
By The Nation
The government was urged on Thursday to launch a nation-building energy fund worth Bt2 trillion to strengthen the new S-Curve sectors, existing industries and the grassroots economy.
Somphote Ahunai, CEO of Energy Absolute, told a seminar organised by the Institute of Business and Industrial Development that the fund could be established via gradual issuance of government bonds.
The bonds should carry a maturity length of 30 years and an interest rate of 3 per cent per annum, he added.
Of the total fund, Bt200 billion should be spent on supporting power producers, building power transmission lines and expanding the network of charging stations. It should also support electric vehicle (EV) producers and incentives for EV users.
Somphote said if all 20 million vehicles in Thailand switched to electric power, Thailand would save Bt100 billion per year in energy imports. The government could use this saving to pay the fund’s interest and principle to bondholders.
The remaining Bt1.8 trillion of the fund could be used to boost core industries and the grassroots economy, he added.
Thai Airways International (THAI) said on Thursday its latest repatriation flight landed on Wednesday, carrying home citizens who had been stranded by the Covid-19 pandemic.
Flight TG607 from Hong Kong touched down in Bangkok with 75 passengers aboard at 10.08pm on Wednesday.
THAI’s fifth repatriation service from Hong Kong also carried cargo on both legs of the journey, the carrier said.
Staff from THAI, the Foreign Ministry and the Hong Kong consulate collaborated to organise the flight.
All arrivals in Thailand are subject to two weeks mandatory quarantine.
The quarantine requirement will remain in place when Thailand reopens to foreign tourists as early as next month.
Krungsri (Bank of Ayudhya) is focusing on Japanese investment in the Eastern Economic Corridor as a key driver of its business growth over the next few years.
The bank on Thursday said its membership of the Mitsubishi UFJ Financial Group (MUFG), Japan’s largest financial group, gives it a competitive edge to promote new investment from Japan.
Said Yoshiyuki Horio, Krungsri head of Japanese Corporate and Multinational Banking (JPC/MNC):
“To enhance our leadership in the market, Krungsri JPC/MNC has set up business promotion initiatives via both assets and liabilities ends as well as promoting FX and derivative transaction opportunities, and trade and settlement transactions. While we continuously strengthen relationships with customers to be their main operating bank, we maximise the cross segment collaboration within Krungsri as well as leverage synergies with MUFG and other partner banks in the region focusing on operational excellence, data intelligence and professional skill enhancement.”
Krungsri JPC/MNC also underlined its measures to help businesses through the Covid-19 crisis, including additional credit facilities to support working capital and liquidity, providing market and industry outlook through web seminars, and creating new business opportunities for customers through business matching activities.
According to Thailand’s Board of Investment (BOI), the number of investment projects applying for BOI incentive and privileges in the first half of 2020 increased 7 per cent from the same period last year to 754 projects. Thailand is a major production base for Japanese investment, especially in the automotive industry. Japanese investors ranked No 1 in applying for BOI incentives in the first half of 2020.
“In supporting foreign investment in Thailand, we will focus on the Eastern Economic Corridor [EEC] project as a key growth driver for JPC/MNC Banking over the next few years,” Horio added.
As Trump moves closer to Pelosi in economic aid talks, House speaker must decide next move
Biz insightsSep 18. 2020House Speaker Nancy Pelosi
By The Washington Post · Rachael Bade, Erica Werner · NATIONAL, HEALTH, CONGRESS, HEALTH-NEWS STIMULUS-ANALYSIS
WASHINGTON – House Democrats were starting to squirm earlier this week, fretting that House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s risky gamble in economic relief talks would backfire and they would go into the November elections without any new stimulus package.
But President Donald Trump scrambled that calculus Wednesday when he cast aside the Republican negotiation position and told his party to embrace a much larger spending bill, including stimulus checks, to give Americans more money. In short, he moved closer to Pelosi’s position after a month-long showdown.
Now the California Democrat faces a crucial decision: Does she try to negotiate an agreement with a White House that suddenly seems ready to deal, or continue to hold her ground and make Trump, facing his own election woes, swallow the sweeping $2.2 trillion bill she has long demanded.
Early signs suggest Pelosi’s still not ready to budge.
“Great, call me when he’s at $2.2 trillion,” Pelosi told Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin during a private call Wednesday, referring to Trump.
Holding her ground with Trump may be the easy part. It also means facing down an insurrection from the very members she’s long tried hardest to protect, the swing-seat Democrats whose victories in GOP-leaning districts returned Democrats to the House majority last year.
These centrist Democrats, fearful of constituent blowback, are pushing Pelosi to return to the negotiating table and strike a deal with Trump on an expansive relief package – even if she can’t get the $2.2 trillion she wants. Congress has already approved roughly $3 trillion in emergency spending in response to the coronavirus pandemic, and Pelosi has called for much more. The latest Republican offer, the one Trump dismissed, was closer to $300 billion.
There’s a palpable fear among Democrats that voters will blame them on Election Day should they appear to be putting their own reelections ahead of what’s good for Americans.
“We should have that same level of urgency that we had when we were dealing with this in March and April,” said Rep. Andy Kim, who flipped a GOP district in New Jersey last election. “And I don’t really get that sense that that type of just timeliness and that urgency is underlying what everybody here is feeling right now.”
The infighting has created an odd situation whereby Pelosi’s centrist members have applauded the position of a president they voted to impeach just months ago. Some of these moderates offered kudos for Trump on Wednesday after he praised a $1.5 billion bipartisan coronavirus deal put forward by the Problem Solvers Caucus, a group of 50 pragmatic-minded Republicans and Democrats in the House — and tweeted that his own party should consider “much higher numbers,” signaling his openness to a deal.
“The tweet that Trump just sent out saying that he was open to more resources for the American people is a good thing because they need more resources,” said Blue Dog Coalition leader Stephanie Murphy, D-Fla. “We can argue about what the specifics of a plan should look like, but the important thing is that we get back to the negotiating table and hammer out a deal that can be passed into law.”
Pelosi, meanwhile, had dismissed the Problem Solvers pitch, having her top policy chairmen put out a statement saying the proposal “falls short” and “leaves too many needs unmet.”
The diss by senior House Democrats infuriated many frontlines eager to work with the GOP. Rep. Max Rose, D-N.Y., a vulnerable New York Democrat from a district Trump carried in 2016, called their statement “laughable,” “idiotic” and “representative of why everyone hates this place.”
“That does not speak to what they should be doing as party leaders,” Rose said. “Sit down. Work something out. We have a bipartisan road map right here. Then you put the ball in [Senate Majority Leader] Mitch McConnell’s’ court.”
Republicans have sought to exploit the Democrats’ divisions.
“I think knowing her well, she cares more about politics than she does about the people,” House Minority Leader Kevin McCarthy, R-Calif,) said Thursday. “And that’s unfortunate. That’s why she should not be fit for that job.”
But underscoring the complex calculations at play for everyone involved, McCarthy is simultaneously quelling a rebellion of his own, one that could undercut his criticism of Pelosi.
A group of conservative House Republicans have begun discussing trying to use an obscure House procedure to try to force a vote to boot Pelosi from the speakership, known as “a motion to vacate the chair,” first reported by Politico. The action, they believe, would require moderate Democrats to decide whether they want Pelosi as speaker, putting them on the spot at a moment of internal tension.
McCarthy has made clear his concerns that it would only backfire by giving vulnerable Democrats a chance to separate themselves from Pelosi just ahead of an election where she’s unpopular in some of the GOP-leaning districts they represent.
“I’m in favor of defeating Nancy Pelosi,” McCarthy said in an interview Wednesday night with conservative host Laura Ingraham. “The real challenge would be we’re four weeks away from election. These Democrats could vote against Nancy Pelosi, use it in their campaigns to say they’re not with her even though they vote with her 95 percent of the time.”
At the same time such a move by conservative Republicans would almost certainly make Pelosi stronger, unifying Democrats behind her and pushing their own internal skirmish to the back burner. Despite her current predicament with moderates, Pelosi, many Democrats believe, is stronger than ever as speaker. Notably, many moderates upset with Pelosi have refused to call her out by name – and make it a point criticize both GOP and Democratic leaders for the coronavirus talk standoff.
Pelosi has served as speaker during two different stints, first from 2007 until 2011 and then retaking the gavel in 2019. She is expected to continue in her role next year if Democrats retain control the House.
Privately, some House Democrats eager to return home in early October with something concrete in hand have echoed GOP speculation that Pelosi and Schumer don’t want to negotiate because a deal could help McConnell, R-Ky., keep the Senate, giving cover to his vulnerable GOP members in tough reelections.
Pelosi, for her part, flatly denies that politics has anything to do with her negotiating tactics. The GOP’s proposals thus far, she has argued for months, would do little to stem the hardship faced by Americans struggling amid the pandemic.
Last week, the Senate GOP tried to advance a relief package that was a mere fraction of what House Democrats have demanded, ringing in at just around $300 billion in new spending. Senate Democrats blocked the bill, which excluded any new stimulus checks and did not include money for rental or nutrition assistance that Pelosi has demanded.
Still, the game of chicken between Pelosi and moderate Democrats is striking. While liberal in her own beliefs, the speaker has routinely put the needs of her so-called Majority Makers over the desires of the left. For two years she has eschewed demands for a Medicare for All vote that centrist worried would repel swing voters in their GOP-leaning districts. She has kept the left’s beloved Green New Deal at arm’s length too, as moderates fret about blowback.
For the first nine months of 2019, Pelosi also stood firm against liberals’ calls to impeach the president, even after a majority of her caucus demanded his ouster – all in the name of her frontliners. And even after the Ukraine scandal forced her hand, she took the advice of her moderate members over some of her own investigative chairmen, including calls to keep articles narrow and focused on Trump’s bid to pressure the nation to investigate his political rival.
Yet on coronavirus, the gap between the frontlines and Pelosi has only widened in recent days, as her moderate members call to reopen talk and pass legislation closer-aligned to what Republicans would accept.
The matter will come to a head in a matter of days. Congress is set to leave town the first week of October and not return until after the election. Pelosi, in a nod to the pressure from moderates, has vowed that the House won’t adjourn until they pass something addressing he virus. But the promise was vague and perhaps a bit misleading: The House can technically stay in session even if members return home to their districts, on standby to come back to Washington to vote if needed – and Pelosi hasn’t committed to making members physically stay in town.
Some moderates hope Pelosi will come around and make a deal — particular now that the Problem Solvers Caucus has laid out a bipartisan blueprint.
“It seems like all sides are willing to go back to the table to get something done,” said Rep. Josh Gottheimer, D-N.J., the leader of the Problem Solvers Caucus who helped negotiate their recent proposal. “It’s unconscionable to go home before the election without helping families and small businesses, and I think there’s a deep recognition that now, at this point, that it’s simply impossible to go home without getting something done.”
Some senior Democrats agree House Democrats’ current position is untenable. Pelosi’s No. 2, House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer, D-Md., has already made clear that he is sympathetic to the frontliners’ concerns. Those close to him believe he would be fine with having a vote on another package before they leave town, even if it’s smaller than the plan Pelosi wants.
But the speaker has been known for her iron grip on her caucus — and despite the standoff with her frontliners, that has not diminished.
In a news conference on Thursday, Pelosi once again touted House Democrats’ $3.4 trillion coronavirus relief package that passed the House in May, chiding the president for not doing enough to save the hundreds of thousands of American lives that have been lost amid the pandemic.
“It didn’t have to be that way,” she said solemnly – a sign blaring the name of the House’s coronavirus relief package — “Heroes Act” — in bright blue and white lettering before the podium.
When asked about moderates wanting her to put a new, perhaps smaller proposal on the floor, Pelosi bristled, arguing that “they didn’t say it to me.”
“I’m very proud of the dynamism in our caucus,” she said of the lively debate.
Some Democrats are happy with Pelosi’s positioning. Trump’s insistence that he is willing to increase the price of the package, they argue, is proof that her tactics are having results.
“It sounds like it’s working pretty well,” said Rep. Mary Gay Scanlon, D-Pa., praising the speaker for her tough line.
But telling that to some Democrats facing difficult reelections is another matter entirely.
“We’re back home and every place I go people are like, ‘what’s the status of the new covid deal? Like where is it?'” said Rep. Elissa Slotkin, D-Mich., who faces a tough reelection in a Trump-carried district. “And that’s business owners wanting another [small business aid] law and that’s our food banks. That’s our teachers. I mean, it’s everybody.”
The price of gold rose by Bt50 per baht weight in morning trade on Friday (September 18), the Gold Traders Association reported.
As of 9.26am, the buying price of a gold bar was Bt28,650 per baht weight and selling price Bt28,750 while gold ornaments were priced at Bt28,136.96 and Bt29,250, respectively.
At close on Thursday, the buying price of a gold bar was Bt28,600 per baht weight and selling price Bt28,700, while gold ornaments were priced at Bt28,091.48 and Bt29,200, respectively.
The Comex (Commodity Exchange) gold price to be delivered in December dropped by US$20.6, or 1.05 per cent, closing at $1,949.9 (Bt60,758.09) per ounce on Wednesday.
Gold price closed in negative territory on Thursday, as investors were disappointed with US Federal Reserve’s move. Although the central bank indicated it would maintain the interest rate at a low level for three years, it did not reveal any measures to stimulate the economy.
Hong Kong gold price rose by HK$70, opening at $18,030 (Bt72,471.45) per tael on Friday morning, the Chinese Gold and Silver Exchange Society reported.
The Stock Exchange of Thailand (SET) Index rose by 4.76 points, or 0.37 per cent, to 1,289.16 in the morning session on Friday (September 18).
An analyst at Krungsri Securities expected the index to fluctuate between 1,275 and 1,295 despite the oil price that rose over US$40 per barrel.
“The student protesters’ political rally tomorrow [Saturday] and the FTSE’s index rebalancing,which would be effective Friday evening, would cause volatility in the SET,” he said.
He recommended that investors buy:
▪︎ Stocks whose third-quarter performance will improve, such as TU, ASIAN, COM7, CHG, PTG and PLANB.
▪︎ Stocks that will benefit from the rising oil price, such as PTTEP, TOP and PTTGC.
The SET Index closed at 1,284.40 on Thursday (September 17), down 9.08 points or 0.70 per cent. The volume of total transactions was Bt46 billion with an index high of 1,292.42 and a low of 1,280.11.
The index fell in line with foreign stock markets due to uncertainty about the global economic recovery after the US Federal Reserve indicated it would maintain the interest rate at a low level for three years.
EEC Office secretary-general Kanit Sangsubhan
Somphote Ahunai, CEO of Energy Absolute 
Yoshiyuki Horio 
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi
