Pets Corner makes new furry friends after buying rival chain Pampurred Pets for £6m April 4, 2016 Pets Corner, the high street retailer dedicated to furry and scaly critters, has bought rival business PamPurred Pets for £6m to create the UK's second biggest pet chain. The Sussex-based company was founded by husband and wife team Mark and Sandra Richmond in 1968 and has since grown to 110 stores across the UK. The acquisition will add another [...]
Belvoir share price soars as profits at the property services group jump by a quarter April 4, 2016 Belvoir Lettings, the Aim-listed agency business which runs a network of franchises across the UK, said revenues jumped by 19 per cent to £6.9m over the year, boosted by acquisitions. Shares in the company, which counts ex-City workers and former servicemen among its franchisees, have surged by more than 13 per cent after posting a 25 per cent jump in profits to £2.2m, [...]
Elephant & Castle scheme and East Village site merged to create £1.4bn private rented sector venture April 4, 2016 The owners of the East Village residential neighbourhood on the Olympic site and the first phase of redevelopment at Elephant & Castle town centre have agreed to merge the schemes to create a vast £1.4bn private rented sector estate. Qatari Diar Real Estate Investment Company, Delancey’s flagship client fund, DV4, and the Dutch pension fund asset manager, APG, [...]
Slow and steady for the FTSE 100 as it stumbles into Monday, edging up in early morning trading April 4, 2016 The FTSE struggled to get going this morning with a so-so start to the first full week of the new financial year. The blue-chip index crawled up 12 points in the first hour of trading to stand at 6,158, after slipping back at the end of last week from its highest close of the year [...]
Cost of weekly supermarket shop drops for fourth month in a row to hit lowest level in over a year April 4, 2016 The cost of the average weekly grocery shop has fallen for the fourth month in a row to reach its lowest level in over a year, data released today shows. Research by price comparison site MySupermarket found that a basket of 35 staple products across the major grocers cost £84.36 in March, down 3.8 per [...]
UK house prices: south east to outperform London in 2016 as buyers seek out more affordable homes, says Cebr April 4, 2016 House price growth will slow to 4.9 per cent this year, according to a new report out today, with the south east poised to outpace the capital as buyers look for better value elsewhere. The study, published by the Centre for Economics and Business (Cebr), says 2016 is turning into a year of two halves [...]
House prices soar by 47,000 per cent in the 90 years since the Queen was born April 4, 2016 The price of the average British home has ballooned by 47,000 per cent since Queen Elizabeth II was born in April 1926, new research shows, rising from £619 to £291,505 over the past 90 years. Data from the Office for National Statistics (ONS) and analysed by Jackson-Stops & Staff to mark the Queen's birthday later [...]
Oil prices fall after Opec freeze deal is thrown into doubt April 1, 2016 Oil prices edged lower today, after comments from Saudi Arabia threw the widely anticipated freeze deal into doubt. Brent crude, the global benchmark, fell 4.2 per cent to $38.6 per barrel this afternoon. Meanwhile, West Texas Intermediate crude, the US benchmark, tumbled 3.9 per cent to $36.86 per barrel. Read more: How the oil price rout will affect [...]
Serious Fraud Office asks Monaco for help with investigation into oil industry corruption April 1, 2016 The Serious Fraud Office (SFO) has asked Monaco for help investigating alleged corruption in the oil industry. It put in an urgent request for international judicial assistance in criminal matters to its government, resulting in it raiding the offices of oil services firm Unaoil and the homes of its directors. Two media reports said that [...]
The euro is currently up one per cent on the pound at £0.80 April 1, 2016 The euro is currently up one per cent on the pound. On the pound, the euro stands at £0.80 – higher than it has closed in 2016 after starting the year at around £0.77. Read more: Goldman warns Brexit could slash sterling by 20 per cent Meanwhile, sterling was down nearly 0.7 per cent against the dollar at $1.43 shortly after US jobs data [...]