Sterling falls below $1.30 to five-week low September 20, 2016 The pound has lost its shine today, falling below crucial levels against both the euro and the dollar. By early afternoon sterling was trading down 0.6 per cent against the greenback at $1.2959 as speculation ahead of the US Federal Reserve's meeting grips the currency markets. Against the euro, the pound dipped 0.5 per cent to [...]
Are government bonds too expensive? September 20, 2016 Government bond yields could have passed their nadir, investment banks and bond analysts have suggested, with borrowing costs rising and the outlook for major economies in flux. As the US Federal Reserve has hesitated on raising rates, the Brexit vote threw the financial markets into brief turmoil and the Eurozone has shown only tentative signs [...]
Faroe Petroleum falls to a loss but hikes production targets September 20, 2016 Shares in independent oil and gas explorer Faroe Petroleum rose as much as 1.53 per cent to 66p after the North Sea player hiked its production forecasts. The figures Revenue fell 54.8 per cent year-on-year to £23.1m in the six months ended 30 June, down from £51.1m a year earlier. Lower revenue and higher exploration costs helped [...]
Before the bell: What you need to know before the US market open September 20, 2016 Theresa May has been buttering up Wall Street following the Brext vote and drug giant GlaxoSmithKline has a new chief executive. Here's what you need to know before the US open at 2:30pm London time. The US futures markets are pointing higher ahead of the open. The S&P is up by 0.38 per cent, the Nasdaq [...]
Oil prices swing wildly as market receives mixed messages September 20, 2016 Oil prices swung wildly today as traders weighed diminished concerns over rising US stockpiles against the broader market outlook. Brent crude, the global benchmark, jumped as much as 0.76 per cent to $46.30 per barrel as a key US petrol pipeline was on pace to return to service following an outage, offsetting concerns over a potential rise in crude [...]
IG Group bemoans summer’s trading snoozefest September 20, 2016 You'd have thought the past few months would have been pretty interesting (if not downright hairy) for spread betters like IG Group – but this morning the company said quiet market conditions had hit business. The figures The online trading group said revenues in its first quarter hit £111.4m, up 5.1 per cent from last year. It put [...]
Why Stateside aggression is increasingly familiar to European investors September 20, 2016 An abundance of liquidity relative to opportunities has led to investors agreeing to lend to companies at relatively high leverages without the usual conditions that enable them to renegotiate terms when the businesses underperform. Almost all deals syndicated that are taking place in Europe this month are covenant-lite, which means that investors will be unable to [...]
Sun shines for Channel Islands exchange as it claims 229 more listings in first half of 2016 September 19, 2016 An independent Channel Islands exchange has reported 229 new listings in the first half of 2016. The Channel Islands Securities Exchange (CISE) said this figure represented a 13 per cent increase on the same period last year and took its total number of listed securities to 2,222 at the end of June. Read more: Leading [...]
Air Astana to outline plans for London IPO September 19, 2016 Kazakhstan flag carrier Air Astana will detail plans for its initial public offering today, with London in line to be chosen for a secondary listing. In a presentation today it’s expected the company will outline how much of it will be sold. The IPO is currently scheduled for between October next year and October 2018. [...]
Hollywood Bowl float expected to kick off strong period for London IPO market September 18, 2016 Hollywood Bowl is set to float on the London Stock Exchange (LSE) this week, kicking off what is set to be an active post-summer period for the market in initial public offerings (IPOs). “If the markets hold up, then I think we’re going to be very busy,” Mark Austin, a capital markets partner at law firm Freshfields [...]