VENTURE CAPITAL POST

South Korea's Samsung Electronics Co Ltd (005930.KS) has applied for a license to invest $3 billion in building a second smartphone factory in northern Vietnam, a government official said on Monday.

General Electric Co is planning to divest stakes in its joint venture auto-financing and credit card businesses in South Korea, people familiar with the matter told Reuters, as the U.S. conglomerate continues to trim its exposure to the financial services sector.

Samsung Group heir apparent Jay Y. Lee is moving to acquire small stakes in two of the group's financial firms, which analysts say will help the scion solidify control of South Korea's largest conglomerate as a succession looms.

South Korea's National Pension Service does not support the merger of two Samsung Group units and plans to ask them to buy back its holdings in the pair, an NPS spokeswoman said on Saturday.

Auto parts maker Delphi Automotive Plc (DLPH.N) is looking to sell its business that makes heating and cooling systems for cars, and will seek as much as $1 billion, Bloomberg reported, citing people with knowledge of the matter.

Cheil Industries Inc, widely seen as the de facto holding company of Samsung Group [SAGR.UL], is likely to offer around 1.5 trillion won ($1.41 billion) worth of shares in its upcoming initial public offering (IPO), a person with knowledge of the matter said on Wednesday.

Samsung Electronics Co Ltd does not expect a price war to break out in the semiconductor industry next year even though it is ramping up capacity, the chief executive of the world's biggest memory chip maker said on Tuesday.

Nissan Motor Co is recalling about 238,000 Altima sedans from the 2013 model year because a secondary hood latch may not hold, increasing the risk of a crash, U.S safety regulators and the company said on Friday.

The finance ministers of Japan and South Korea will hold their first bilateral meeting in nearly two years on Friday, on the sidelines of this week's autumn IMF gathering in Washington, the Japanese Ministry of Finance said.

Samsung Electronics Co Ltd plans to invest $14.7 billion to construct a new chip production plant in South Korea, a major bet on its semiconductor business amid a smartphone earnings slump.

Standard Chartered (STAN.L) is in advanced talks to sell its Hong Kong consumer finance business to finance firm Pepper Australia Pty Ltd in a deal that could fetch between $500 million to $700 million, people familiar with the deal said.

Financial policymakers of Japan, China and South Korea agreed to work together to ensure that geopolitical tensions will not threaten the region's economic recovery.

Washington is facing growing international pressure to ease its long standing ban on crude oil exports, with South Korea and Mexico joining the European Union in pressing the case for U.S. oil shipments overseas.

Samsung Heavy Industries will absorb Samsung Engineering for about $2.5 billion, the latest step in a restructuring at South Korea's largest conglomerate that has accelerated since the controlling Lee family's patriarch was hospitalized in May.

Factory activity in Europe and Asia cooled in August after a strong July, as new orders dwindled in the face of escalating tensions in Ukraine and a patchy recovery in China, purchasing managers indexes showed.