Expect to pay £8bn for Aviva’s general arm, UBS warns RSA August 18, 2010 RSA Insurance would have to crank up its offer for Aviva’s general insurance business by nearly two thirds to win the backing of the larger company’s shareholders, a UBS analyst said yesterday. UBS put the highest valuation yet on Aviva’s casualty and property operations in the UK, Ireland and Canada, suggesting RSA would have to [...]
GM files for its historic flotation, expected to raise up to $20bn August 18, 2010 GENERAL Motors (GM) will press ahead with an historic initial public offering (IPO) that is expected to raise almost $20bn. The firm filed papers with the Securities and Exchange Commission last night that confirmed the long-expected flotation. Trading in GM shares is expected to start sometime between late October and the 25 November Thanksgiving holiday. [...]
Lone hawk at MPC calls for a rise in rates August 18, 2010 THE Bank of England’s Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) voted 8-1 to keep monetary policy on hold in August, suppressing speculation of a three-way split among members, the minutes of this month’s meeting showed yesterday. Eight members, including newcomer Martin Weale, overruled Andrew Sentance’s third call for a 0.25 per cent rise in interest rates and [...]
German retail sales revised up August 18, 2010 GERMANS spent more in the first half of the year than had previously been estimated, according to the Federal Statistics Office. The official figures now show that retail sales rose by a real 0.9 per cent during the first six months of the year on the same period of 2009 compared to the previous estimate [...]
ECONOMIST VIEWS: DO YOU THINK THE MPC WOULD RESTART QE? August 18, 2010 MICHAEL SAUNDERS | CITI Contrary to market speculation, no one voted to extend QE and we continue to regard the extension of QE as unlikely. The sum of real GDP growth and CPI inflation – a proxy for nominal GDP growth – implies that extra stimulus is not needed to keep inflation on target over [...]
EMI seeks a fresh £100m cash injection August 18, 2010 EMI is confident private equity investor Terra Firma will pump a further £100m or so into the business next March to help it avoid a breach of its loan covenants, it is understood. Maltby Capital, EMI’s holding company, is expected to require an equity cure “substantially in excess” of the £87.5m injected this year when [...]
Basel: Cost to growth of new banking rules will be modest August 18, 2010 NEW bank rules will cut global output by a small fraction, a “modest” price to pay for greater stability, the Basel Committee on Banking Supervision said yesterday, dismissing lenders’ warnings that they may curb growth severely. The new “Basel III” rules for banks’ capital and liquidity will tighten lending and reduce investment during a transition [...]
Druckenmiller says he will finally retire after 30 years at the top August 18, 2010 Stanley Druckenmiller, a key player in George Soros’ famous bet against the pound that earned him $1bn (£640m), said he is closing his firm after 30 years. In a letter sent to his 100-plus investors, Druckenmiller, chief executive officer of Duquesne Capital Management, said “competing in the markets over such a long timeframe imposes heavy [...]
Maersk lifts forecast after posting profit August 18, 2010 MOLLER-MAERSK, the shipping and oil conglomerate, raised its outlook for the year yesterday after swinging back into half-year profit, on the back of increased volumes and a sharp rise in the price of crude oil. The Danish group said it now stands to make in excess of $4bn (£2.6bn) after tax in 2010, following a [...]
DP World gets boost from rise in global trade August 18, 2010 DUBAI-BASED port operator DP World posted a surprise 10 per cent rise in first-half profit yesterday thanks to growing container volumes and better pricing. The government-controlled firm said profit attributable to shareholders reached $164m (£105m)?in the first six months of the year. Net profit after tax from continuing operations rose to $206m from $188m a [...]