Turbulence and tailwinds: how savers can seek returns and save the planet February 14, 2019 Isa season is upon us. With just a few weeks left to go before the end of the 2018/19 tax year, canny savers are scrambling to use up their tax-free allowance before the 6 April deadline. The task became more of a challenge this year after the government, in a bid to bolster Britain’s savings culture, [...]
Shares in medical device company Convatec fall 20 per cent on ‘disappointing’ results February 14, 2019 Shares in medical products company Convatec plunged 20 per cent this morning after it unveiled a “disappointing” set of 2018 results. Adjusted earnings before interest and taxes (Ebit) fell six per cent year-on-year to $429.4m (£334.5m), despite a 3.8 per cent increase of reported revenue to $1.832bn. Its Ebit margin was 23.4 per cent, down [...]
Germany narrowly avoids recession as GDP remains flat in the fourth quarter February 14, 2019 Germany narrowly avoided a recession at the end last year as GDP remained flat in the final quarter of 2018. The Eurozone powerhouse’s economy had contracted in the third quarter and another contract would have seen it enter a technical recession. Read more: Eurozone industrial production suffers sharpest fall in almost three years But the [...]
Options are running out for the man who destroyed Venezuela February 14, 2019 It takes some front for a man who has presided over a double-digit recession for three successive years to claim that his country is being destabilised by a “gang of extremists” rather than his own inept economic performance. But that is exactly what Venezuela’s embattled President Nicolas Maduro did this week, when he stated that the [...]
US considers 60-day extension to looming China tariff deadline February 14, 2019 US President Donald Trump is mulling a 60- day extension of the 1 March deadline for higher tariffs on Chinese imports, according to reports. Trump is considering an extension to the 1 March deadline for more than doubling tariffs on $200bn (£156bn) of Chinese exports in order to give the two sides more time to come to [...]
US President Donald Trump’s trade war with China is following a familiar path February 13, 2019 It has been nearly a year since Donald Trump infamously tweeted that “trade wars are good, and easy to win,” adding, for extra emphasis, “it’s easy!” How things change. America’s most enthusiastically protectionist modern-day President isn’t finding talks with China so simple after all. This week he rowed back on a supposedly-hard deadline that was [...]
Italian football club Juventus enlist Morgan Stanley to help in €175m bonds sale February 13, 2019 Italian footballing giants Juventus have ramped up their efforts to raise money after paying €100m to buy Portuguese star Cristiano Ronaldo last summer, issuing bonds to investors. The club originally planned to offer €150m (£131.4m) worth of bonds maturing in around five years at a 3.5 per cent yield, but City A.M. understands this has increased to €175m. Read more: [...]
Five charts to gauge the environment for equities February 13, 2019 | City Talk Stock markets wax and wane. The period of time in which they move from a state of expansion (bull market) to one of contraction (bear market), before expanding again is known as the “market cycle”. Last year was an extremely difficult one for stock markets, prompting much commentary as to which ones had “corrected” (falls [...]
Inflation drops to two-year low of 1.8 per cent as electricity and fuel prices fall February 13, 2019 The UK inflation rate fell to a two-year low of 1.8 per cent in January as electricity and gas prices continued to drop. The Consumer Price Index dropped from 2.1 per cent in December, falling below the Bank of England’s two per cent target for the first time since 2017. Read more: German inflation stalls [...]
Good, old-fashioned economic growth is the key to happiness February 13, 2019 Newly installed as Prime Minister, a fresh-faced David Cameron declared in November 2010 that “the country would be better off if we thought about wellbeing as well as economic growth,” as he launched a £2bn plan to measure the UK’s happiness. Measuring wellbeing is no easy task. Just ask the Happy Planet Index, which in [...]