PRE-MARKET AUSTRALIAN, JAPANESE AND SOUTH KOREAN STOCKS NEWS: Hanwha Ocean (042660 KS) won a KRW 1.55tln order from Taiwan’s Yang Ming Marine Transport to build six LNG dual-fuel container ships
Newsquawk Staff ·
AUSTRALIA
Corporate Travel Management (CTD AT) - Co. resumed trading on the ASX following its suspension; FY26 (AUD) net 17.7mln (prev. loss 348.5mln Y/Y), EBITDA rose 36% Y/Y to 113.6mln, rev. rose 4% Y/Y to 669.9mln. (Motley Fool)
Nufarm (NUF AT) - Bell Potter reaffirmed its buy rating on the Co. and said recent peer reporting points to continued margin recovery for Nufarm, while trade flows suggest a solid inventory rebuild ahead of major selling windows. (Motley Fool)
Other News
APRA imposed licence conditions on ING Bank Australia and will require it to hold additional capital and liquidity following material breaches of minimum liquidity requirements. (APRA)
JAPAN
Fujitsu (6702 JT) - Co. is unlikely to continue producing commodity-grade products and may transfer some operations, while retaining a focus on AI-related hardware. (Nikkei)
Komatsu (6301 JT) - Co. plans to increase construction equipment supply to North America as AI-driven data centre investment supports demand. (Nikkei)
Marubeni (8002 JT) - Co. intends to focus on long-term structural opportunities rather than chasing short-term semiconductor trends, with Berkshire Hathaway cited as a model for disciplined investment. (Nikkei)
Mitsubishi Heavy Industries (7011 JT) - Co. will collaborate with NEC on domestically developed defence drones and AI-powered command and control systems. (Nikkei)
NEC (6701 JT) - Co. is open to acquisitions of manufacturers as it targets growth opportunities in physical AI, aerospace and defence. (Nikkei)
SoftBank Corp. (9434 JT) - Co. completed Japan’s first successful trial of a stratospheric communications base station and is targeting commercialisation in 2027. (Nikkei)
SoftBank Group (9984 JT) - Co.’s SB Energy could achieve a valuation of around USD 50bln in a US IPO, supported by its relationship with NVIDIA and lease commitments from OpenAI despite having no data centre revenue. (Nikkei)
Toyota Motor (7203 JT) - Co. delayed the launch of its first US-built EV, an electric Highlander, to 2027 or later due to production delays, rather than weaker US EV demand. (Nikkei)
SOUTH KOREA
Hanwha Ocean (042660 KS) - Co. won a KRW 1.55tln order from Taiwan’s Yang Ming Marine Transport to build six LNG dual-fuel container ships. (Yonhap)
Korea Electric Power (015760 KS) - Co. is seeking KRW 25tln in prepaid electricity fees from Samsung Electronics and SK Hynix. (Newswires)
What it means
This is the standard pre-market Asia equity digest, with the flagged item a KRW 1.55tln container-ship order for Hanwha Ocean from Taiwan's Yang Ming, covering six LNG dual-fuel vessels. Orders of this kind from Taiwanese carriers to Korean yards have been a recurring feature of the fleet-renewal cycle, and the established read on such prints is that they confirm backlog and pricing power rather than surprise: Korean and Chinese yards have dominated large dual-fuel container orders, so a Korean win is the pattern holding, not breaking. The dual-fuel specification reflects the continuing shift in liner ordering toward LNG-capable tonnage, a trend driven by emissions rules and fuel-flexibility economics rather than any single contract. For the stock, single-vessel-batch orders of this size have historically moved shipbuilders only modestly on the day, with the bigger swing factor being the margin and slot-year implied rather than headline value, detail not disclosed here. The rest of the digest is the usual mix: APRA's licence conditions and capital add-on for ING Bank Australia follow the regulator's established sequence of liquidity breaches leading to conditions before any escalation, and the Japan items are thematic colour around AI capex, defence and IPO speculation, the SoftBank SB Energy valuation line being the kind of unpriced rumour that typically trades on follow-up confirmation or denial. Nothing here changes the regional macro picture; the items are single-name catalysts for the open.
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