Early to bed and late to rise: Londoners sleep more than people in most major cities October 1, 2014 London is certainly not the city that never sleeps. According to SleepCycle, which monitors the sleeping patterns of people in 54 major cities across the world, Londoners get more sleep a night than most. It measured the capital's average wake-up time as 07:29, putting it 43rd out of the 54 cities. Among [...]
The Co-operative strips its board down to seven members in a bid to recover from £1.5bn capital hole scandal October 1, 2014 The Co-operative Group has cut down its board to seven members after agreeing to changes to the way it's governed following a mismanagement scandal that's plagued the group for over a year. Eleven directors have left the firm to create the new “transitional board” of seven members, with two more soon to join – [...]
Productivity gets even more puzzling, as output falls 0.3 per cent October 1, 2014 Bank of England governor Mark Carney's "productivity puzzle" was back with a bang this morning, after figures published by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) showed labour productivity fell 0.3 per cent on the year before during the second quarter. Carney has previously said productivity is one of the Bank's biggest concerns. While indicators such [...]
Tory donor Arron Banks switches to Ukip as David Cameron prepares for Conservative party conference speech October 1, 2014 The Conservative party has suffered yet another blow with the defection of party donor Arron Banks to Ukip. Banks will donate £100,000 to Nigel Farage's eurosceptic party and could stand as a Ukip candidate in the 2015 general election. An insurance entrepreneur, Banks has made significant donations to the Conservative party since David Cameron became [...]
Songbird Estates sells Northern Trust’s Canary Wharf offices to Crosby Investments for £152.5m October 1, 2014 The developer behind the Canary Wharf financial district has sold one of its most recognisable buildings for £152.5m. Until the sale to Crosby Investments, Songbird Estates let the majority of the building to Northern Trust, a US financial company, for £8.6m a year. The lease expires in 2022. Songbird suggested it will use the proceeds [...]
More Tube chaos with delays and cancellations on the Central, Circle, Hammersmith & City and Metropolitan lines October 1, 2014 More chaos for London's Tube users this morning, after a broken-down train at Tottenham Court Road caused Transport for London (TfL) to suspend the line between Liverpool Street and Marble Arch. To make matters worse, the Hammersmith & City, Metropolitan and Circle lines were hit with severe delays while TfL fixed a signal failure at [...]
Tesco share price falls again as Financial Conduct Authority confirms investigation into £250m profits black hole October 1, 2014 October has not started off well for beleaguered Tesco. This morning, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) confirmed the launch of a full investigation into the supermarket following last month's profit overstatement. On 22 September, Tesco warned investors that its profit outlook for the half year to August had been overstated by £250m. It blamed [...]
Sainsbury’s share price falls following drop in sales October 1, 2014 Shares in Sainsbury's fell 2.97 per cent to £2.44 this morning, following an announcement by the supermarket its sales have fallen for the third quarter in a row. In its second-quarter trading statement for the three months to the end of September, it reported like-for-like sales, excluding fuel, were down 2.8 per cent during [...]
Royal Bank of Scotland share price dips after raising £85m through equity issue October 1, 2014 Royal Bank of Scotland's share price dipped in early trading this morning, after revealing it had raised £85m through a share issue. RBS' share price fell 0.5 per cent at pixel time today. The bank, which yesterday said it expected impairment charges to be significantly lower than expected, revealed it had alloted 23.8m [...]