Alcatel faces two fraud suitsTwo class-action lawsuits filed here accuse French telecom giant Alcatel of fraud by artificially inflating its share price ahead of the purchase of US-based DSC Communications. Alcatel this week issued a profits warning in view of cuts in investment by European telecommunications companies and due to crises in Asia and Russia, causing shares in suppliers to the telecommunications industry to crash and pulling down all markets heavily.A class action suit by the law firm of Abbey, Gardy and Squitieri charges Alcatel and its officers ``artificially inflated the price of Alcatel common stock by issuing a series of false and misleading statements and press releases to conceal the company's true financial condition.''A second suit was filed in New York by Wolf Popper, alleging similar misconduct by Alcatel. The suit charges Alcatel directors with ``engaging in a scheme to artificially inflate the market price of Alcatel securities by making misrepresentations andomissions'' of its performance, Wolf Popper said. ``Once this information was disclosed on September 17, 1998, the market price of ALA (Alcatel) shares plunged - evidencing the material nature of defendants' prior non-disclosure.''Merger of Taiwan banks proposedA Taiwan Opposition lawmaker is pushing for a merger of Taiwan's three leading banks, which would form a company big enough to be among the world's top 90 banks, a report said.In an interview with the Economic Daily News, MP Lin Wen-lang of the Democratic Progressive Party said he would recommend at Parliament's Wednesday meeting that the three commercial banks - Chang Hwa Bank, First Commercial Bank and Hua Nan Bank merge.Combined assets of the three banks run by the provincial government would amount to 3.16 trillion Taiwan dollars (US $91.7 billion) while its outstanding loans would total 1.96 trillion Taiwan dollars. It would become the island's biggest financial institution.The finance ministry released a statementsaying it would not comment on the report now that the provincial government still owns the banks' great majority shares.Workers protest HK telecom wage cutEmployees and labour unions protested against proposed wage cuts at Hong Kong Telecommunications Limited as the firm sought ways to deal with a deepening recession. Negotiations between Hong Kong's main telecommunications provider and its employees over a proposed 10 per cent wage cut were deadlocked after their Union flatly rejected it at a meeting with management on Friday. Another round of talks is expected to be held this week, as several groups staged protests. Sources said they would not rule out staging industrial action if Hongkong Telecom took further measures to cut their pay or benefits. Hongkong Telecom had announced that it would cut salaries by 10 per cent from November to save 300 million Hong Kong dollars (US$39 million) a year amid the territory's economic recession.
