The nine judges of the Supreme Court’s Criminal Division for Holders of Political Positions will begin to unveil their personal judgments on Friday morning. The judges’ individual verdicts will then be presented as the court’s verdict later on this afternoon. The court will commence with the ruling process at 1:30 pm today.

Airports of Thailand Plc (AoT) management are scratching their heads as to why Suvarnabhumi Airport failed to secure a top spot as one of the world’s best in the latest polling. It will seek external expert advice to determine what went wrong and vows to work even harder to ensure that Suvarnabhumi climbs the customer satisfaction survey conducted by the Genevabased Airports Council International (ACI). Suvarnabhumi ranked 24th in the 2009 ACI polling, up from 38th in 2008 and 48th in 2007, its first full year of operation.

Toyota Motor (Thailand) reported domestic auto sales of 49.6K in January, up a record 54.5% YoY, but down 31.2% MoM. The YoY improvement was supported by a positive industry backdrop boosting consumer spending, such as local economic recovery, improved consumer confidence and low base in 2009. Domestic auto sales dropped MoM from December due to seasonality, as December’s auto sales are typically high because of the Motor Expo (there were 72.1K automobiles sold in December, including 25K automobile orders placed at the Motor Expo).

Oil consumption in January dropped almost 10% compared to the same period last year and a month earlier, due to consumers’ lack of confidence, according to the Department of Energy Business. Director-general Peerapol Sakarin said consumption of all types of fuel in January averaged 19.3m litres per day, down from 21.4m litres a year earlier, and also down 8.9% from 21.1m litres in December.

A Government House source quoted Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva as saying at yesterday’s cabinet meeting that the US carmaker, which is planning to invest 20 billion baht, wants the government to find solutions to the Map Ta Phut issue as soon as possible. Ford is scheduled to sign a contract on Feb 15 with Hemaraj Land and Development Plc for land at the Hemaraj Industrial Estate, which covers parts of Chon Buri and Rayong provinces. The company might change its investment location if the government’s solutions were delayed, said the premier.

The Small and Medium Enterprise Development Bank of Thailand plans to aggressively expand and approach more SMEs nationwide to increses its total loans by Bt30b from Bt56b last year. (The Nation)

Thai Stanley Electric reported a FY3Q10 (October – December 2009) net profit of Bt286mn, up 17.3% YoY and 36.9% QoQ. Excluding FX gain, normalized profit was Bt281mn, rising 9.8% YoY and 31.2% QoQ. The result was above the market expectation of Bt230-240mn. A higher-than-expected gross margin was the reason earnings beat expectations.

The country’s gross domestic product should rise 3.5% while the government revenue is expected to be more than Bt200b for this fiscal year, according to Prime Minister Abhisit Vejjajiva.

Auto sales in December jumped to 72,085 units, a 22.2 percent increase from the same period last year. Some of the increase was attributed to bookings at the Thailand International Motor Expo.  Mazda saw its sale increase 176 per cent on year, while other premium players like BMW and niche players like Hyundai and Tata also posted high sales for the month. Yet, the most successful brand in December was Toyota in terms of sale volume, with the sale of 28,342 units. It represented a 9.1 per cent increase on year. Falling the second was Isuzu with sale of 14,113 units and a growth of 23.9 percent. Honda comes at the third place with 11,851 units sold and a growth of 9.7 percent. In fourth place was Nissan, which had sales of 4,990 units and a growth of 67 percent. In fifth place was Mitsubishi which has sales of 3015 units and saw a growth of 58.6 percent. Every segment in the market saw the growth, with the passenger car segment seeing a growth of 27.7 percent, followed by the pickup market which saw a growth of 11.4 percent and the PPV segment which saw a growth of 45 percent. (The Nation)

According to finance minister Korn Chatikavanij, a Korean investor is interested in bidding for SCIB shares. The FIDF is currently in the process of divesting its 47% holding stake in SCIB.