Big City banks must be allowed to grow again February 7, 2010 TOMORROW, Barclays chief executive John Varley will become the latest business leader to appear before the Treasury Committee’s inquiry into how to solve the problem of banks that are deemed too important – or too large – to fail. Following President Obama’s recent proposals, this is a hot topic at the moment and the committee’s [...]
MAJOR ISSUES AT THE G7 MEETING IN CANADA February 7, 2010 EURO ZONE FISCAL CRISIS European G7 countries told the US, Japan and Canada they would ensure Greece delivered on its promises to slash its budget deficit by the end of 2012. FINANCIAL REGULATION Last September, world leaders asked the IMF to come up with proposals for a levy on banks to help pay for financial [...]
BAE Systems fined £280m over corruption charges February 5, 2010 BAE Systems is to pay a fine of $400m (£250m) after pleading guilty to a charge of conspiring to make false statements to the US government. The UK’s largest defence group has also reached agreement with the UK Serious Fraud Office (SFO) to plead guilty to breach of duty to keep accounting records. That case [...]
BA reports ‘better than expected’ £50m loss February 5, 2010 BRITISH Airways has reported a £50m pre-tax loss for the third quarter as passenger numbers fell. The result for the three months to December 31 was better than the £151m forecast by analysts. The airline’s deficit for the first nine months of its financial year was £342m. BA boss Willie Walsh said the better-than-expected results [...]
Waitrose sales jump by 15 per cent February 5, 2010 WAITROSE sales jumped by 15 per cent in the second half of last year. The figures mean Waitrose is fastest growing supermarket chain in Britain and come as Ocado – the online grocer that delivers Waitrose products – set a new record for the number of deliveries in a single day, of 17,500. New M&S [...]
Cadbury to delist from stock exchange February 5, 2010 KRAFT Foods has secured 75.41 per cent acceptances from Cadbury Plc shareholders in its takeover of the British confectioner and will now move to delist Cadbury form the London Stock Exchange. Kraft said in a statement that assuming it gets 90 per cent acceptances from Cadbury shareholders it intends to move toward the compulsorily purchase [...]
Bellway urges caution over housebuilding February 5, 2010 HOUSEBUILDER Bellway today said it remains cautious over the prospects for the housing market despite a modest pick-up in sales in first-half trading. The Newcastle-based group sold 2,247 homes in the six months to the end of January, up 12 per cent on the previous year. Its order book stood at £390 million or 2,506 [...]
Bank of America hit by fraud prosecution February 4, 2010 EXECUTIVES from Bank of America (BoA) are the first top bankers to face charges in the wake of the financial meltdown. Former chief executive Ken Lewis and former chief financial officer Joe Price will face charges after the New York State attorney filed civil fraud allegations yesterday. Andrew Cuomo accused the pair, along with the [...]
Euro debt crisis worse even than UK’s February 4, 2010 THERE is a crucial yet often over-looked difference between the mounting fears over the solvency of Greece, Portugal and Spain and worries about Britain’s debt mountain. All four countries are borrowing far too much – yet Britain still controls its own currency, sterling, in which our government’s debt is denominated. We could theoretically print our [...]
BoE suspends its QE policy February 4, 2010 BRITAIN yesterday looked set for its first interest rate hike since the crisis started after the Bank of England turned off the taps on its emergency £200bn quantitative easing programme. The Bank chose to suspend quantitative easing and kept interest rates at 0.5 per cent. The monetary policy committee (MPC) judged that the current stimulus [...]