Gazprom Neft reinstates the chief exec it replaced less than a week ago June 22, 2009 RUSSIAN oil and gas giant Gazprom yesterday did a U-turn over its plans for Aim-listed Sibir Energy, re-appointing Stuard Detmer as chief executive of the firm just days after replacing him with a candidate from its own legal team. Sibir said in a statement it had re-appointed Detmer at the request of the group’s oil [...]
How the Baker Street brigade are taking on the Big Four accountants June 22, 2009 YOU get the impression when you meet him that Simon Michaels, the managing partner of BDO Stoy Hayward, wants a lot of things – and one of the first is a larger slice of the UK accounting pie. Michaels, at 42 the youngest person to lead the UK’s sixth-largest professional services business, was elected to [...]
Virgin seals 1.3bn deal on birthday June 22, 2009 VIRGIN ATLANTIC splashed out on its 25th birthday yesterday with a $2.1bn (£1.28bn) deal, saying it would take delivery of 10 new Airbus A330-300 aircraft between now and 2012. The birthday goodies will allow the airline to expand while it waits for the delivery of Boeing’s troubled 787 Dreamliner. The planes, each seating up to [...]
BEST OF THE BROKERS June 22, 2009 BELLWAYUBS upgraded Bellway to “buy” after its trading update confirms a stabilising market. The broker has factored in write-downs in 2010 of £54m, and has new earnings per shares estimates of 15.27p in 2009 and 1.19p in 2010. GO-AHEAD GROUPGo-Ahead’s pre-close update has shown the company to be on track for Royal Bank of Scotland’s [...]
New interactive strategy pays off for NetPlay TV June 22, 2009 GAMING firm NetPlay TV yesterday said its losses had narrowed over the past year as its strategy of chasing the live gaming market started to pay off. NetPlay posted a £1m pre-tax loss for the year to December, compared with a £4.4m loss the previous year. Revenue soared by 118 per cent to £19.8m. “The [...]
CITY MOVES Who’s switching jobs June 22, 2009 AvivaThe insurance group has appointed Jon Bunn as its new corporate affairs and communications director in Europe. Bunn will report to Andy Moffat, Aviva’s director of human resources in Europe. He was previously group public relations director at Prudential, and before that was director of media relations at accountancy firm PricewaterhouseCoopers. He began his career [...]
Rose waives 1.1m share award payout June 22, 2009 SIR Stuart Rose, executive chairman of Marks & Spencer, yesterday waived his entitlement to more than £1m in shares in a bid to appease disgruntled shareholders. Under the incentive share plan, M&S’s remuneration committee had awarded Rose 1,184,900 shares. But after a shareholder backlash led by the Association of British Insurers (ABI), Rose said he [...]
INDEPENDENT CONSIDERS CASH CALL June 22, 2009 INDEPENDENT News and Media (INM), publisher of The Independent newspaper, is mulling a deeply-discounted rights issue as part of the refinancing of its €200m (£169m) bond. INM is in talks with shareholders, including former chief executive Sir Tony O’Reilly (left) and Denis O’Brian, who have a combined stake of over 50 per cent.
Blue Oar, now Astaire, fined 225,000 by LSE for breaching Aim regulations June 22, 2009 STOCKBROKER Blue Oar Securities, which recently changed its name to Astaire, was yesterday hit with a £225,000 fine from the London Stock Exchange (LSE) and publicly censured for breaching the Aim market rules. The LSE said Blue Oar failed in its duty as a nominated adviser (Nomad) to Worthington Nicholls, now called Managed Support Services, [...]
Apple’s new iPhone sells 1m in week one as Jobs returns June 22, 2009 APPLE said yesterday that it had sold more than 1m of its iPhone 3GS in the first three days of launch, making it the most successful smart phone debut to date. The rush to secure the latest model beat analyst expectations and matched the sales for the old 3G model, despite being launched in just [...]