New tax year ushers in more woe for businesses and households April 6, 2022 Today marks the start of what will be yearly increases in tax bills for households across the UK as a raft of hikes, threshold freezes and fiscal tweaks come into effect. The new tax year has been ushered in by the much-lamented 1.25 percentage point national hike, which is forecast to deal a more than [...]
Energy giants fuel London indexes ahead of government white paper April 5, 2022 London’s top indexes were boosted by investors pouring into energy stocks yesterday ahead of the UK government publishing its much-awaited energy strategy. The capital’s premier FTSE 100 index rose 0.72 per cent to 7,613.72 points, while the domesticall-focused mid-cap FTSE 250 index, which is more aligned with the health of the UK economy, edged 0.13 [...]
European Union proposes total ban on coal from Russia in another £3bn blow to Moscow April 5, 2022 The European Commission has proposed new sanctions against Russia, including an import ban on coal worth 4 billion euros (£3.3 billion) per year. European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen said the EU needed to increase the pressure on Russian President Vladimir Putin after what she described as the “heinous crimes” carried out around Kyiv. [...]
The Russia–Ukraine war and other geopolitical risks April 5, 2022 | City Talk The war in Ukraine is dominating the headlines. For now. But the conflict’s indirect reverberations will ripple far beyond the borders of its combatants and their allies. Indeed, they could give rise to new and varied geopolitical risks throughout the world. The war’s potential effect on the global grain supply and food inflation is especially [...]
10m British pensions at BlackRock ‘helped’ Putin’s invasion of Ukraine via £1bn in oil energy dividends April 5, 2022 Fund manager BlackRock – which oversees 10 million British pensions – has helped Putin build his war chest by investing heavily in Russia’s biggest companies, the Bureau of Investigative Journalism told City A.M. this morning. While those investments have strengthened Putin, they have also generated a fortune for BlackRock’s clients, the group said. Since 2014, [...]
Moneycorp plots complete withdrawal from retail as fintech giant shifts focus to payments and banking April 5, 2022 Fintech giant Moneycorp plans to exit from its last remaining retail branches at Gatwick Airport. “Today’s announcement marks an end to the group’s retail franchise and an important step in its evolution from a UK foreign exchange business to a global payments and banking services provider,” the company said in a statement sent to City [...]
Inflation heats up as UK firms launch record price rises April 5, 2022 The cost of living squeeze that is already threatening to cool growth is tightening, driven by UK businesses lifting prices at the fastest pace on record to cope with a cost storm, a closely watched survey released today reveals. A combination of soaring staff costs, swelling energy bills and higher raw material prices has coaxed [...]
Shanghai completely shut: ‘Extremely grim’ Covid outbreak in China’s biggest city deepens with 26m people confined to their homes April 5, 2022 Amid an ongoing lockdown confining around 26m in Shanghai, a city official said this afternoon local time that the Covid-19 outbreak in China’s largest metropolis of Shanghai is “extremely grim” The director of Shanghai’s working group on epidemic control, Gu Honghui, was quoted by state media as saying the outbreak in the city was “still [...]
Ukraine war is dramatically dialling up risk of global recession April 5, 2022 The war in Ukraine has dramatically dialled up the risk of a global recession, according to leading economist. The conflict has thrown a ‘massive monkey wrench’ into what was a gradually improving post-pandemic picture, Ira Kalish, chief global economist at Deloitte told delegates at the World Retail Congress in Rome. And it could have damaging, [...]
What does the current volatility mean for energy transition investing? April 5, 2022 | City Talk The driving forces behind the energy transition remain as strong as ever and the current market volatility has only enhanced these trends. There is a lot going on in the financial markets right now. Meaningful inflation has returned for the first time in decades. Supply chains everywhere continue to be disrupted. Geopolitical and social tensions [...]