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 [...]
Capital rules push banks to trade through central counterparties April 10, 2014 BANKS will have to set aside less capital against trades through central clearing houses in a bid to encourage them to use the services, the Basel Committee said yesterday. And lenders face putting more capital against trades not cleared centrally. The aim is to make banks use the central counterparties (CCPs), making it easier for regulators [...]
Ashmore hopes for emerging market uptick April 10, 2014 BILLIONAIRE Mark Coombs, the founder of fund manager Ashmore Group, yesterday gave a bullish assessment of emerging market stocks despite his group seeing $6.2bn flow out of funds last quarter. Coombs, chief executive at the FTSE 250 group, tried to soothe concerns that emerging markets were broken in the wake of steep price declines and [...]
Struggling RSA Insurance taps investors for £773m rights issue April 10, 2014 INSURER RSA Group announced yesterday that 95.67 per cent of its share issue has been snapped up by investors, raising £773m for the group. The remaining stock will be offered for sale by JP Morgan and Merrill Lynch, but if it is not sold, under their role as underwriters, they will buy the balance themselves. [...]
Cairn Energy loses its deputy chief and its finance director April 10, 2014 SCOTTISH oil and gas explorer Cairn Energy yesterday said its deputy chief executive and its chief financial officer are stepping down for “long term succession planning reasons”, merely weeks after founder Sir Bill Gammell said he would retire as chairman. Deputy chief Mike Watts and finance director Jann Brown will not seek re-election at the [...]
Stelios takes up Fastjet cash call April 10, 2014 African budget airline Fastjet yesterday raised £11m through a private placement of shares, including a £1m investment from a unit of EasyGroup, the firm led by EasyJet founder Sir Stelios Haji-Ioannou. EasyGroup has also agreed to waive £4.3m in consultancy fees in exchange for £1.5m-worth of new shares. The Aim-listed airline, which expects to post [...]
Rothesay’s £111m bulk annuity April 10, 2014 Rothesay Life, the life insurer co-owned by Blackstone and Goldman Sachs, yesterday struck a £111m bulk annuity deal with Western United Group Pension Scheme. It follows a similar £115m deal between the two last year. The transaction will see the pension scheme transfer some of its investments over to Rothesay. “Repeat business is the best [...]