Why Game of Thrones is now the most important show on TV April 7, 2014 Tonight’s broadcast of Game of Thrones isn’t just the start of another fantastic season of bloodletting, beheading and gratuitous violence, it’s actually the most important thing happening on TV. For Sky, it’s the payoff from a £150m bet it made on HBO (the US channel behind Game of Thrones) in 2010 for exclusive UK access [...]
Gehry and Foster unveil Battersea Power Station designs April 7, 2014 Architects Frank Gehry and Norman Foster unveiled their designs yesterday for the next phase of development at Battersea Power Station that will include 1,300 homes on either side of new high street forming the gateway to the landmark building. It will be the first building in London for the Canadian-American Gehry, whose best known works [...]
EU Commission accused of blocking whistleblower clause April 7, 2014 Transparency at the European Union has taken a blow after the European Commission refused to apply the same rules it requires of national statistical offices to the Commission's own agency, Eurostat. In 2012, MEPs had agreed to extend the rules governing national statistics offices to apply to Eurostat and wanted to insert a "whistleblower clause" [...]
What you need to know before the US open April 7, 2014 Last week was rounded off with a late selloff on US markets, following the latest, and disappointing, jobs report. Fed chair Janet Yellen has been trying to persuade investors that the central bank intends to keep interest rates low, taking into account a jobs market that’s “not back to normal health”. Be that as it may, [...]
Brits hate Easter but Lindt is top of the chocs April 7, 2014 Easter may be bouncing towards us faster than you can say “oh goodness I’ve eaten five packets of chocolate buttons,” but it seems most of us don’t give a toss. Some research from Webloyalty has detected vast disillusionment, 79 per cent of respondents to the survey said Easter was not important to them, 66 [...]
The Eurozone’s most powerful finance ministers are tiptoeing around their big division April 7, 2014 This morning veteran German finance minister and new French finance minister Michel Sapin met in Berlin, giving an amicable press conference that did little more than hint at perhaps their biggest split on policy Sapin is not as outwardly radical as incoming economy minister Arnaud Montebourg, but is nonetheless tasked with pushing for less stringent [...]
Pope gives Vatican bank changes his blessing April 7, 2014 Pope Francis has approved recommendations on the future of the Vatican bank, saying the scandal-hit lender will stay open. The See of Rome has put out a statement disclosing that the Holy Father has said yes to a proposal on the future of the Works of Religion (IOR), as the bank's formally known. The proposal will [...]
Here’s what the world’s biggest investment banks are saying about today’s cement giants merger April 7, 2014 Investment banks JP Morgan and UBS have given a ringing endorsement to the news that Holcim and Lafarge, the world's two largest cement companies, were in advanced merger talks on Friday. On Monday, the companies confirmed plans for a merger that could potentially control 40 per cent of cement manufacturing, with a market cap of [...]
Why can’t you get a good burger in London any more? April 7, 2014 There’s something very destructive and subversive currently sweeping its way through London – the death of the good burger. For any true connoisseur, there is nothing like biting into a nice, juicy beef burger, but it seems restaurants are now doing their utmost to stop this. Numerous eateries across London, including Bread Street Kitchen, Brasserie [...]
Deutsche Bank strategist confirms Game of Thrones party with dress up and “plotting world domination” April 7, 2014 A glimpse into the goings on at a global investment bank – and it’s not all money and strategy. In a morning research note, Deutsche Bank reveals that it’s not gold, cement company mergers or Eurozone investor confidence that’s gripped it, but the latest Game of Thrones episode. It begins, thanks to strategists Jim Reid [...]