“One small step for WeBank, one giant step for financial reform”: China opens its first private bank under pilot scheme to help small businesses grow January 6, 2015 Yesterday, China opened its first web-only private bank, with the intention of helping small and micro-sized enterprises secure loans that commercial lenders are often unwilling to give them, due to a higher perceived risk compared to larger companies. Chinese investment company Tencent owns 50 per cent of the new bank, dubbed WeBank (see what [...]
Goldman Sachs forecasts Tories will win the 2015 General Election January 6, 2015 Journalists, pundits and pollsters are widely agreed that this year's General Election is the most unpredictable in decades. The rise of the SNP in Scotland, Ukip in England, the Greens threatening Labour's left flank, coupled with a general loathing of Westminster establishment politics, is leaving most commentators unable or unwilling to give their predictions. However, [...]
Oil prices are falling again as Brent crude edges closer to $50 a barrel January 6, 2015 Brent crude is flirting with the $51 a barrel mark, falling again on Tuesday after yesterday’s carnage. Considered an international benchmark, it fell $1.42 to $51.64 in early trading, despite data showing 17 US oil rigs stopped operating in the week leading to 2 January. The fall takes the number of rigs to 1,482 which, [...]
Eurozone services PMI disappoints in December January 6, 2015 It's yet more bad news for the eurozone economy after miserable growth in its three largest economies ensured the single currency bloc disappointed again in December. The eurozone's three biggest economies – France, Italy and Germany – had disappointing performances according to Markit's final December Composite Purchasing Managers' Index (PMI). The index, where any reading [...]
Moonpig apps unavailable as it confirms security flaw January 6, 2015 Moonpig has confirmed it's "investigating" a vulnerability in its code which means personal details of three million customers may have been exposed for almost a year and a half. The company said many of its apps would be "unavailable for a time" while it looked into a blog posted yesterday warning that hackers could easily [...]
Bupa: Workers who skip lunch risk harming their productivity January 6, 2015 While Britain's workers feel they're too busy to take proper breaks, opting for paperwork over lunches can actually reduce overall work performance, according to new research by Bupa. The research, which looked at 2000 full-time workers, found less than a third of employees took the full lunch hour every day. What's more, 28 per cent [...]
Ukip website down: Indie Oxford record label claims to have bought domain name January 6, 2015 Ukip's disappeared earlier today with the official address linking to a domain hosting page. In what is becoming an increasingly bizarre story, an Indie record label based in Oxford has claimed to have bought the party's domain on Twitter. The political blogger Guido Fawkes originally speculated that the problem could be down to the party [...]
Peppa Pig meets Saving Private Ryan? Entertainment One buys stake in Mark Gordon Co January 6, 2015 Is this the beginning of new mash-up, a la Alien vs Predator? The production company known best for its Peppa Pig TV series has just acquired a majority stake in the company founded by the producer behind, among other things, Saving Private Ryan. Entertainment One (known to its friends as eOne) said this morning it had bought [...]
Love is in the air – but is it in your borough? We crunch the numbers to find where most people are single in the UK January 6, 2015 You can't turn on the TV without being invited to think of 2015 as the year you finally meet The One. Here at City A.M. we're a cynical bunch and we think playing the numbers game is probably the best way forward. So we've crunched the numbers and found out where the most single men [...]
Why is the first quarter the worst time of year for retail administrations? January 6, 2015 Hating January already? Be thankful you're not a retail business, because the festive hangover is even more brutal for them. The first quarter has been consistently the biggest period for retail failures looking back over the past three years – and experts believe 2015 could see even more companies collapse as the repercussions of [...]