Software king bounces back April 15, 2010 WHEN Michael Jackson joined the board as non-executive chairman of online gambling firm PartyGaming in 2005, he knew that he had kissed goodbye his chance to join what he calls the City’s “great and the good”. PartyGaming’s US business was under scrutiny and subsequently it chose to close down its US operations as a result [...]
Weighing up that big move overseas April 15, 2010 IN THE past two weeks BlueCrest, one of the largest hedge funds in the City, and chemicals group Ineos have both announced they are leaving the UK for tax reasons, relocating to Guernsey and Switzerland. But will the UK’s tax and regulation laws force entrepreneurs to do the same? Yes, says David Kilshaw, partner at [...]
SALES April 15, 2010 Q. I have recently started my own business but I don’t have much experience with selling, are there any techniques I should learn? A. The first thing about being successful at sales is to have the right attitude. Forget the old, hard image of sales. Modern selling is consultative, says Edward Dulson, managing director of [...]
FTSE 100 hits 22-month high as solid US results boost investor sentiment April 14, 2010 BRITAIN’s top share index hit a 22-month closing high yesterday, as solid results from JP Morgan and Intel and strong US retail sales lifted hopes that a recovery in the world’s biggest economy is gaining momentum. The FTSE 100 closed up 34.59 points, or 0.6 per cent, at 5,796.25 — its highest close since June [...]
S&P soars through 1,200 as JPMorgan results cheer April 14, 2010 US stocks notched a fifth straight day of gains as stronger corporate results and March retail sales pushed the S&P 500 past 1,200 for the first time in 18 months. Dow components Intel and JPMorgan Chase paced the market after both posted strong results. JP Morgan was up four per cent on the Dow to [...]
A bright future for 10-year-old European ETFs April 14, 2010 IT WAS 10 years ago this week that Merrill Lynch unveiled the first exchange-traded funds (ETFs) in Europe and listed them on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange. Britain was not far behind – iShares launched its first FTSE 100 ETF on the London Stock Exchange on 28 April 2000. A decade later, the European ETF industry [...]
LISTED PRODUCT NEWS April 14, 2010 SOUTH AFRICA STORY Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) has recently launched a new accelerated tracker that gives exposure to South Africa’s stock index, the FTSE/JSE Top 40 index. This is the second South African product it has launched in recent weeks. It recently launched covered warrants on the same index. Ben Board from RBS says [...]
In business, sorry is the hardest word April 14, 2010 LAST week technology giant AOL revealed that it is planning to close or sell the social networking site Bebo, which it bought for $850m just two years ago. It’s fair to say that was an expensive error. Everybody makes mistakes in business – even if they hopefully don’t end up costing you the best part [...]
CAREERS CLINIC April 14, 2010 I AM worried that after the election there is going to be another round of problems for the economy and that I am going to have to make cuts in my department. We’ve already been through the recession, how do I deal with this? Microsoft’s chief executive Steve Ballmer once said that you can always [...]
Bankers must look hard at pay if they want to win back the public’s support April 14, 2010 JUDGING by public and media sentiment over the past couple of years, the fairground arcade staple of whack-a-mole will at some point be replaced by the sport of whack-a-banker. The credit crunch blame-game does not appear to be dissipating. A particular bone of contention between the banks, politicians and the public is the issue of [...]