Bunzl set for more buyouts August 31, 2010 RETAIL packaging behemoth Bunzl is eyeing a large acquisition in the US, analysts believe, after it raised pre-tax profits six per cent to £100m and increased its dividend. The supplier of take-away boxes and hard hats said it had a “promising” pipeline of ideas as it delivered a robust set of interim results. Bunzl has [...]
FSA fines and censures two mortgage brokers for fraud August 31, 2010 THE FINANCIAL Services Authority (FSA) has banned one mortgage broker and fined another for committing “reckless business practices”, which it said led to false and misleading mortgage applications made to lenders. Ngozika Louise Ogboru, who ran Harrow based JN Finance UK, has been banned by the financial watchdog after it found that advisers at her [...]
ANALYST VIEWS: WHAT DID YOU MAKE OF BUNZL’S FIRST HALF NUMBERS? August 31, 2010 paul checketts | oriel securities There’s a lack of drama in some senses, but the headline numbers are great. Earnings per share were up 10 per cent to 27.5p and they lifted the dividend. It just shows they’re doing a cracking job in tough markets. mike murphy | numis securities We think the mergers & [...]
Activist ups heat on F&C August 31, 2010 ACTIVIST investor Sherborne has increased its stake in British fund firm F&C Asset Management to just short of 15 per cent, piling fresh pressure on F&C management and fuelling takeover speculation. F&C confirmed yesterday that Friday’s trade of 16m shares had seen Edward Bramson’s Sherborne Investors hike its stake to 14.6 per cent from 11.3 [...]
Genzyme says it is still up for sale August 31, 2010 GENZYME chief executive Henri Termeer said he is willing to sell the company he built up over 25 years, but not for $69 a share. Termeer yesterday said it was unlikely that French drugmaker Sanofi-Aventis SA would go hostile with its $18.5bn bid and that the two sides had a good chance of coming to [...]
French push to regulate commodities August 31, 2010 FRANCE has sent detailed proposals to the European Commission calling for common action to regulate volatile commodities markets before it is due to head the Group of 20 economic powers, ministry officials said. President Nicolas Sarkozy said last week that regulating commodity derivatives would be one of the priorities of France’s presidency of the G20 [...]
August sees investors start to turn bullish August 31, 2010 A GROWING belief among British investment managers that fears of a renewed economic slump are overblown has halted a five-month decline in allocations to stocks, according to a Reuters poll. The survey of 11 British fund managers polled on asset allocations in August shows the average exposure to equities jumped more than three percentage points [...]
Hitachi mulls hard-drive IPO August 31, 2010 HITACHI is planning an initial public offering (IPO) of its hard-drive unit and could name underwriters in early September, several people familiar with the situation said. Bankers are in discussions with Hitachi about an IPO of the world’s third-largest hard-drive maker, several sources said. The stock float would be in the United States and could [...]
Weak housing loans point to a price slump August 31, 2010 JUST 48,700 mortgages were approved in July, according to data published yesterday by the Bank of England, raising fears that the UK housing market is at best drifting sideways and at worst heading for a double-dip recession. Although the small rise was better than the dip to 46-47,000 that the market had expected, economists were [...]
US home prices jump in June August 31, 2010 Prices of US single-family homes gained more than expected in June and rose in the second quarter, reflecting the lingering boost from homebuyer tax credits that ended in April, Standard & Poor’s/Case Shiller home price indexes showed yesterday. The effects of buyer tax credits have largely filtered through and home prices will be hard-pressed to [...]