A Spring is in the air this May – Shareholder revolt set to build with Aviva and Reckitt Benckiser meetings May 3, 2016 Company bosses are braced for further uprisings this week. Consumer goods group Reckitt Benckiser, insurance giant Aviva, and FTSE 250 hedge fund Man Group all host shareholders for their annual general meetings. Last week the shareholder spring picked up pace as investors voted against boardroom pay rewards for engineering firm Weir Group and Shire, the FTSE [...]
London’s Crossrail and HS2 projects helps drive UK’s attractiveness for infrastructure investors May 3, 2016 London schemes such as Crossrail and High Speed 2 have helped drive the UK to greater attractiveness for infrastructure investment. The Global Infrastructure Investment Index, published today by Arcadis, puts the UK in ninth place globally, up from 10th in 2015 and 13th in 2012. This makes it one of the fastest-growing of the 41 countries [...]
How institutional investment and crowdfunding are dominating the growth capital market and making individual investors a distinct minority April 30, 2016 In the first quarter of this year we saw strong activity in growth capital raising with institutional investment, including crowdfunding, dominating over direct investment. This is largely due to the increasing sophistication and specialisation of institutions in providing growth capital, coupled with the increasing activity of crowdfunding platform operators over the last few years. Read [...]
Peer-to-peer securitisation has arrived with “landmark” crowdfunding deal April 30, 2016 Securitisation has arrived in the peer-to-peer market, with lending platform Funding Circle announcing a "landmark transaction". The European Investment Fund, part of the European Investment Bank Group, and KfW, a German government-backed bank, are investing in the securitisation of loans originated on the crowdfunding platform. Read more: P2P securitisation is coming Securitisation is used to transform illiquid financial [...]
How Brits are bringing home £1.3bn of bacon and stashing it in piggy banks, glass jars and “on the side” April 29, 2016 Brits are stashing more than £1bn in piggy banks, glass jars and "on the side", according to a new study. Virgin Money research suggests millions of UK adults currently use piggy banks. “On the side” stashes were the most preferred, with 16 per cent of those surveyed using this storage facility. Glass jars (12 per cent), [...]
How the UK led private equity buy-and-build activity to four-year high in 2015 April 28, 2016 European buy-and-build activity, where private equity firms acquire a company and merge it with a counterpart before selling the group on, reached its highest level since 2011 last year, according to a new report. Silverfleet Capital’s annual European Buy and Build Monitor tracks this add-on activity across the world. Over the course of the year, it tracked [...]
Finance directors living in fear of pension schemes, particularly following BHS collapse April 28, 2016 Tata Steel and BHS are not the only companies with problematic pensions, as research out today has found that many finance directors have concerns about their own firm's retirement vehicles. The study by Hymans Robertson discovered that one in seven finance directors believe their company's defined benefit (DB) pension is a major risk, while the Pensions Policy [...]
To the happy couple, on your expensive special day: a £5,897 loan April 28, 2016 Even those who don't usually cry at weddings will admit that the £151m worth of wedding loan applications received by one company between 2013 and 2015 is eye-watering. Freedom Finance also revealed today that it had received £8.6m in loan applications from happy couples looking to raise some extra cash for their special day in January and [...]
The death of Aim: Can equity crowdfunding eclipse the LSE’s junior market? April 28, 2016 The alternative finance market enjoyed near triple-digit growth last year, with the value of its loans, investments and donations hitting £3.2bn. Within this, the main sub-sectors of peer-to-peer lending and equity crowdfunding significantly increased awareness of the concept of lending directly to individuals – excluding those entities like the banks which have for too long dominated markets [...]
How alternative finance is making supply chain finance sexy – a Q&A with C2FO’s Colin Sharp April 28, 2016 The world of alternative finance is increasingly varied. There are property equity crowdfunding platforms, remittance firms with Wikipedia payment models. Specialist lending products are growing in popularity and some firms are looking at blockchain technology. Platform C2FO is focused on helping to bring liquidity to business supply chains. It gives companies visibility of their entire [...]