TOKYO (Reuters) - Shares in Hitachi Chemical Co (4217.T) slumped more than 14 percent on Monday following media reports that it had falsified inspections for a material used in semiconductors.

Hitachi Chemical notified its customers of the inspection misconduct for the material used to protect semiconductor chips from scratches and debris, local media reports said at the weekend.

The company said in a statement on Saturday a committee of external experts was investigating the issue. It said it would announce the results as soon as it received a report from the committee. </s> TOKYO (REUTERS) - Hitachi Chemical Co has told customers it falsified inspections for a material used in semiconductors, an industry source familiar with the matter said, the latest in a run of compliance scandals at Japanese firms and the company's second this year.

Shares in Hitachi Chemical fell about 10 per cent by mid-morning on Monday, losing more than 30 billion yen (S$370 million) in market value.

The source, who is not authorised to speak to media on the matter and declined to be identified, said the Hitachi unit recently notified customers of improper tests.

Local media reported over the weekend that the material, which is used to protect semiconductors from scratches and debris, is used in a wide range of products such as computers and other electronic devices.

The company said in a statement on Saturday that a committee of external experts was investigating the issue and would announce the results as soon as they were available.

The revelations follow Hitachi Chemical's admission in June that it found data falsification in quality tests of lead-acid batteries for industrial use over a period of more than seven years, affecting some 60,000 products shipped to roughly 500 companies.

Other recent compliance failings at Japanese manufacturers include scandals at Kobe Steel Ltd, Nissan Motor Co Ltd and Subaru Corp.

The Tokyo Stock Exchange on Monday issued a warning to investors, citing a lack of clarity around the Hitachi Chemical issue. </s> TOKYO (Reuters) - Hitachi Chemical Co has told customers it falsified inspections for material used to encapsulate semiconductors, an industry source familiar with the matter said - the firm’s second compliance failing this year and the latest in a run of such scandals at Japanese firms.

Shares in the Hitachi Ltd unit tumbled 8 percent on the news. While the exact nature of the falsification is not known, the likelihood of a wide-scale recall is seen as slim as most clients normally conduct their own quality inspections.

“Therefore it may be the case that there are no major quality issues with the actual encapsulation materials,” Nomura Securities analyst Shigeki Okazaki wrote in a note to clients.

The source, who is not authorized to speak to media on the matter and declined to be identified, said Hitachi Chemical recently notified customers of improper tests.

Hitachi Chemical said in a statement on Saturday that a committee of external experts was investigating the issue and that it would announce the results as soon as they were available.

Local media reported at the weekend that the inspections were not carried out in line with what Hitachi Chemical had agreed with clients.

The material is used to protect chips from scratches and debris. Hitachi Chemical is the world’s second-biggest producer of such materials with 17 percent market share after Sumitomo Bakelite, which has 20 percent, according to Nomura’s Okazaki.

He noted that encapsulation materials account for over 10 percent of Hitachi Chemical’s core operating profit.

The Tokyo Stock Exchange on Monday issued a warning to investors about uncertainty surrounding the issue.

The 8 percent share slide represents a loss in market value of around 20 billion yen ($180 million), exacerbating recent slides. The stock has lost about 28 percent this month alone.

Sumitomo Bakelite saw its stock climb 2.6 percent on Monday, outperforming a 0.4 percent gain for the broader market.

The revelations follow Hitachi Chemical’s admission in June that it found data falsification in quality tests of lead-acid batteries for industrial use over a period of more than seven years, affecting some 60,000 products shipped to roughly 500 companies.

Other recent compliance scandals at Japanese manufacturers include Kobe Steel Ltd’s admission this year that data fraud had been going on for nearly five decades. Nissan Motor Co Ltd and Subaru Corp have admitted to misconduct in their inspection processes.

KYB Corp, a maker of earthquake shock absorbers, said this month that 900 buildings across the country have or may have used its products for which quality data was falsified. </s> TOKYO (Reuters) - Hitachi Chemical Co (4217.T) said it failed to properly test parts used to encapsulate semiconductors, the firm’s second compliance failing this year and the latest in a run of such scandals at Japanese manufacturers.

Shares in the Hitachi Ltd (6501.T) unit slid 8 percent on the news. Encapsulation materials account for more than a tenth of its core operating profit, according to Nomura Securities analyst Shigeki Okazaki.

But there were few expectations of a wide-scale recall as most clients normally conduct their own quality inspections.

One client, Toshiba Memory, had been told in late September of improper product testing but its own checks had found no quality problems, a spokesman for the world’s No. 2 producer of NAND chips said.

The products cover chips, protecting them from scratches and debris. Hitachi Chemical is the world’s second-biggest producer of such materials with 17 percent market share after Sumitomo Bakelite (4203.T) which has 20 percent, according to Nomura Securities.

Hitachi Chemical said a committee of external experts was investigating the issue and that it would announce the results as soon as they were available. So far, there has been no finding of illegality or problems with product quality, the company said in a statement.

Weekend reports by local media said that the inspections were not carried out in line with what Hitachi Chemical had agreed with clients.

A Hitachi Chemical spokesman said it had not informed investors sooner as the company was waiting for more information from the committee of external experts. The shares have fallen nearly 30 percent in the past month.

The news follows Hitachi Chemical’s admission in June that it found data falsification in quality tests of lead-acid batteries for industrial use over a period of more than seven years, affecting some 60,000 products shipped to roughly 500 companies.

Other recent compliance scandals at Japanese manufacturers include Kobe Steel Ltd’s (5406.T) admission this year that data fraud had been going on for nearly five decades. Nissan Motor Co Ltd (7201.T) and Subaru Corp (7270.T) have admitted to misconduct in their inspection processes.

KYB Corp (7242.T), a maker of earthquake shock absorbers, said this month that 900 buildings across the country have or may have used its products for which quality data was falsified. </s> The company responsible for a chemical spill that left dozens ill in east China "deliberately concealed" the extent of the leak, which was 10 times worse than reported, authorities said.

The spill in Fujian province happened in the early hours of November 4 when a tube transferring the chemicals from a wharf to a tanker broke, spilling 69.1 tonnes of C9 aromatics into the sea.

Fujian Donggang Petrochemical Company, the firm responsible for the incident, had previously reported just 6.97 tonnes.

"From the start, Donggang Petrochemical deliberately concealed, maliciously colluded, and forged evidence," said a statement released by the local Quanzhou city government on Sunday.

According to local authorities, mid-level and higher-up employees were told to keep the real volume of the chemical spill secret at a meeting following the incident in order to "escape" the legal consequences.

Later, the company under-reported the spill and blamed the hose rupture on old and damaged parts.

The local government also accused the petrochemical firm of disorderly management and weak safety protocols.

So far, authorities have arrested seven people over the incident.

Three are employees of the Fujian Donggang Petrochemical Company, which operates the wharf, and four are crew members of the tanker involved in the leak.

Earlier this month, residents near the coast who had come into contact with the C9 reported dizziness, nausea, and breathing difficulties.

C9 is typically used to produce adhesives, printing ink and paint, and is toxic.

A total of 69 residents were hospitalised after the leak, though all are now in "good condition", the state-run China Daily reported Monday.

It is the latest alleged corporate cover-up to make waves in China.

In October, Chinese authorities slapped penalties totalling a whopping $1.3 billion on a pharmaceutical company that fabricated records for its rabies vaccines.

Though authorities said the suspect vaccines did not enter the market, the case provoked outrage from consumers fed up with recurring product-safety scandals, particularly in the drug sector.

In 2008, China was hit with one of its most explosive health scandals when 300,000 children fell ill and six were killed by milk powder laced with the chemical melamine to give the appearance of higher protein levels. Melamine is usually used to make plastic. </s> TOKYO, Oct 29 (Reuters) - Japanese stocks handed back earlier modest gains and slipped on Monday as continuing weakness in U.S. and Chinese shares dampened investor sentiment.

The Nikkei ended the morning session down 0.09 percent at 21,165.30 points, remaining on the defensive after posting their biggest weekly loss in more than eight months.

The broader Topix was down 0.27 percent at 1,591.63.

Wall Street shares fell on Friday after technology and internet shares sold off further, capping another volatile week for U.S. stocks.

The Asian markets followed on Monday, with the Shanghai Composite Index losing 1.5 percent.

"Bargain hunters did come in to take advantage of price dips as the market experienced such a steep decline last week. But much of the action was futures-led and the rebound lacked strength," said Yoshinori Ogawa, senior strategist at Okasan Securities.

"It will require some time for the market to regain its confidence. If sentiment was healthy, reaction to reports of upbeat earnings prospects, notably Sony, would be stronger," Ogawa added.

Sony Corp was down 0.9 percent, shrugging off a report in the Nikkei business daily that the company's consolidated operating profit for the April-September fiscal period was likely to reach a record high.

Kourakuen Holdings Corp soared 12.4 percent after the restaurant chain operator raised its net profit forecast for the year through March 2019 to 739 million yen from 269 million yen.

Another company boosted by upbeat earnings prospects was Shin-Etsu Chemical Co, which gained 6.8 percent after lifting its net profit forecast for the year through March 2019 to 290 billion yen from 270 billion yen thanks to growth in its U.S. chemical and semiconductor silicon businesses.

Hitachi Chemical Co, on the other hand, sank 8.2 percent following media reports that it had falsified inspections for a material used in semiconductors.

Tokyo Tekko Co retreated more than 10 percent as the steel bar maker cut its net profit forecast for the year through March 2019 to 2.5 billion yen from 3.76 billion yen amid a rise in scrap iron prices. (Editing by Kim Coghill) </s> Zacks Investment Research downgraded shares of Hitachi (OTCMKTS:HTHIY) from a hold rating to a sell rating in a report issued on Thursday morning.

According to Zacks, “Hitachi Ltd., headquartered in Tokyo, is one of the world’s leading global electronics companies. They manufacture and market a wide range of products, including computers, semiconductors, consumer products and power and industrial equipment. “

Shares of OTCMKTS:HTHIY opened at $59.04 on Thursday. Hitachi has a fifty-two week low of $56.93 and a fifty-two week high of $85.54. The firm has a market capitalization of $28.53 billion, a price-to-earnings ratio of 10.36, a P/E/G ratio of 0.58 and a beta of 0.99. The company has a current ratio of 1.35, a quick ratio of 0.96 and a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.16.

Hitachi, Ltd. provides information and telecommunication systems, social infrastructure and industrial systems, electronic systems and equipment, construction machinery, high functional materials and components, automotive systems, smart life and ecofriendly systems, other products, and financial services in Japan and internationally.

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Receive News & Ratings for Hitachi Daily - Enter your email address below to receive a concise daily summary of the latest news and analysts' ratings for Hitachi and related companies with MarketBeat.com's FREE daily email newsletter. </s> BEIJING(Reuters) - A plant explosion in China’s Jiangsu province killed seven people on Sunday, authorities said, the second deadly blast in the province this month as Beijing begins a nationwide industrial safety inspection campaign.

A damaged building of a metal-molding plant owned by Kunshan Waffer Technology Co following an explosion is seen in Kunshan, Jiangsu province, China March 31, 2019. REUTERS/Stringer

The blast involved a container of scrap metal that exploded in the outdoor yard of a metal-molding plant in a bonded area in the city of Kunshan, causing the plant to catch fire, the local government said on its official Weibo account on Sunday.

“The cause of the incident is being investigated,” it said. Five people were also injured, one severely, in the blast.

Plant owner Kunshan Waffer Technology Corp Ltd, a Taiwan-based maker of magnesium alloy injection molding products and aluminum alloy die castings, said the incident would reduce the company’s April revenue by about 40-50 percent.

The firm said it could not tell when production would be resumed in the plant in Kunshan.

Shares in the company dropped more than nine percent on Monday morning.

The company was fined last May by the Kunshan environmental protection bureau for violating water pollution rules, according to state-owned newspaper the Beijing News.

Kunshan, about 70 km (43 miles) west of Shanghai, is home to more than 1,000 technology companies and manufacturers, including many Taiwanese firms.

Sunday’s incident follows a deadly blast on March 21 at a chemical park in the city of Yancheng, also in Jiangsu province, that killed 78 people and focused attention on safety at small chemical firms.

Beijing said last week it will launch a month-long, nationwide inspection campaign into hazardous chemicals, mines, transportation and fire safety, adding that authorities needed to absorb lessons from the Yancheng disaster.

The country has a history of major work safety accidents which often trigger inspection campaigns aimed at rooting out violations and punishing officials for cutting corners or failing their supervisory duties.

China has clamped down on scrap metal imports as part of an environmental campaign against “foreign garbage”, tightening supply sources for metal producers, as it aims to cut solid waste imports by the end of 2020. </s> Samsung, which is already in the middle of a massive recall of its Galaxy Note 7 smartphone, has confirmed the company’s washing machines are now catching fire as well.

The US Consumer Product Safety Commission (CPSC) issued a statement on September 28 warning consumers about exploding washing machines from the Korean giant.

“It is important to note that Samsung customers have completed hundreds of millions of loads without incident since 2011,” Samsung said in a statement, following the CPSC warning.

Samsung and the CPSC said the affected units are all top loading-washing machines manufactured between March 2011 and April 2016.

“In rare cases, affected units may experience abnormal vibrations that could pose a risk of personal injury or property damage when washing bedding, bulky or water-resistant items,” Samsung said on its website.

Samsung advised consumers with affected models to use only the delicate and lower speed cycle when washing these items.

Melissa Thaxton, 32, from Georgia, US, said she was standing next to the running machine when it exploded in a special report aired on ABC News.

“It was the loudest sound. It sounded like a bomb went off in my ear. There were wires, nuts, the cover actually was laying on the floor,” she said.

CPSC and Samsung are working on a remedy for affected consumers but neither have specified the cause of the explosions.

It was not immediately known how many units were affected and whether the problem is limited to the United States.

Consumers should report any incidents to CPSC via their website www.SaferProducts.gov.

A lawsuit filed in New Jersey in August, claims that the company “has moved aggressively to collect and destroy all evidence of the defective machines” after they exploded.

US authorities officially recalled one million Samsung phones earlier this month after dozens of the devices blew up.

Samsung had previously issued a voluntary recall of the flaming phones, but US regulators have taken matters into their own hands, after almost 100 cases of the phones catching fire, causing injuries and destroying property.
Japanese company Hitachi Chemical states that it falsified inspections for a material used in semiconductors.