Discounts weigh on M&S despite rise in clothing April 10, 2014 MARKS & Spencer’s revamped womenswear collection, which has been fronted by stars including Dame Helen Mirren, showed signs of recovery in the fourth quarter despite overall general merchandise sales falling for an 11th consecutive quarter. The high street giant yesterday split clothing sales from other non-food sales for the first time, revealing a 0.6 per [...]
Bottom Line: Bolland must use his breathing space wisely April 10, 2014 MARKS & Spencer’s boss Marc Bolland usually looks pretty pleased with himself, but yesterday his proud smile was somewhat justified. By posting the retailer’s best clothing performance in three years – based on an improvement in its crucial womenswear lines – Bolland has proved the critics wrong, pulling something that looks like the start of [...]
Carney to be tested on low rates April 10, 2014 BRITAIN could have less than a year left before the Bank of England considers raising interest rates, analysts hinted yesterday. The warning came as the Bank’s monetary policy committee (MPC) held interest rates again yesterday. The base rate has been held at 0.5 per cent for more than five years, through the financial crisis and [...]
UK must not miss public service boom in emerging economies April 10, 2014 A LEADING business group will today urge the government to ensure the UK benefits from a growing industry in providing public services to people in emerging markets. The Confederation of British Industry (CBI) calculates that public procurement in a dozen key emerging economies will be worth £452bn by 2030 – but warns that, at current rates, [...]
Inside Track: The new issues market drifts into ever choppier waters April 10, 2014 THIS was the week when a sudden reality check intervened in the new issues market. It came after a blissful start to the year that has seen share prices popping, books covered multiple times and investors cashing out most profitably. The big losers earlier this week were the technology stocks, with shares in AO World, [...]
Hays says firms are now hiring across Britain April 10, 2014 A BOUNCE in hiring across the country has helped Hays to lift its profit outlook for the year, pushing shares in the UK’s biggest recruiter to the highest level since the recession. The firm’s UK and Ireland business posted a 14 per cent jump in net fees for the first three months of the year, [...]
Analyst Views: How are Hays and the other recruiters faring? April 10, 2014 PAUL JONES | PANMURE GORDONA good update from Hays, with impressive UK growth and further evidence of a pick-up in activity levels and profitability. We believe recruitment stocks could now deliver increasing levels of profitability as activity and productivity levels improve, and with increasing client confidence the outlook remains positive. DAVID O’BRIEN | SHORE CAPITALWe [...]
Centrica slides on British Gas’ £5.6m penalty April 10, 2014 CENTRICA’S share price slumped over one per cent yesterday, after its supply arm British Gas was fined £5.6m by the regulator for unfairly blocking business customers from switching. Energy firms can prevent customers from switching in certain cases, such as if the customer owes money on the account. But Ofgem found that between 2007 and [...]
Standard Life backs BP executive pay for second time in nine years April 10, 2014 MAJOR BP shareholder Standard Life yesterday said it would back the oil company’s executive pay report for just the second time in nine years, after it called on the remuneration committee to beef up its targets. “Over the last year we have engaged with the company about our concerns and I’d like to place on [...]
Icahn pulls out of Ebay battle over PayPal April 10, 2014 ACTIVIST investor Carl Icahn has backed down from his second corporate fight in as many months, with his decision yesterday to cease his crusade for Ebay to spinoff its fast-growing PayPal unit. In February Icahn abandoned his push for Apple to return $50bn (£29.8bn) to investors via a share buyback. Ebay yesterday said Icahn had [...]