Women and Gen X are feeling blue on their finances for 2026 January 12, 2026 UK adults have reported feeling upbeat about their finances for the year ahead, but women and Gen X do not share the positive sentiment. Six in ten adults said they felt positive about their financial situation going into 2026, maintaining last year’s results and up from the 52 per cent reported in 2024, according to [...]
Ofcom investigation launched into Grok AI deepfakes on X January 12, 2026 The media and online safety watchdog has announced an investigation into Elon Musk’s X, to determine whether the platform has done enough to protect Brits from explicit deepfakes generated by its Grok AI. Ofcom pointed to “deeply concerning reports of the Grok AI chatbot account on X being used to create and share undressed images [...]
Mark my words: Starmer is set to approve China’s ‘super embassy’ January 12, 2026 Keir Starmer is set to travel to China and has appealed for business leaders to accompany him. You don’t do that if you’re anticipating holding a foreign government to account, says Eliot Wilson At the end of this month, Sir Keir Starmer is due to travel to China for the first visit by a British [...]
How day one sick pay will change hiring behaviour January 12, 2026 Few employers disagree with the objectives of day one sick pay, but there could be adverse impacts on hiring behaviour, writes George Reed.
No growth expected for November due to late Budget January 12, 2026 New GDP figures this week will show zero growth in the UK economy as weeks of uncertainty around the Budget weighed down on activity in November, according to economists. A Bloomberg poll of economists predicted the Office for National Statistics (ONS) to write in zero GDP growth in the second last month of the year. [...]
FTSE 100 Live: Barclays slumps on credit card cap, Fed’s Jerome Powell faces probe January 12, 2026 Good morning from the City AM liveblog team. The FTSE 100 broke through the five-figure mark last week in a welcome start to the year for the London markets. The index saw its best annual performance in 2025 since the recovery from the financial crash in 2009. That was helped along in no small part [...]
Business confidence lowest in nearly five years, BDO says January 12, 2026 Business confidence fell to its lowest level in nearly five years, an advisory company indicated, as the Labour government is expected to oversee a small improvement in the UK economy this year. BDO’s optimism index, which tracks sentiment by surveying 4,000 executives, dropped to its weakest reading since January 2021 at the end of last [...]
Manufacturers warn UK faces ‘tipping point’ on competitiveness January 12, 2026 The Labour government has been handed a major warning over the future of the manufacturing industry as the sector battles rising costs and pressures to shift business to shift overseas. A fresh survey from the sector’s industry body Make UK showed senior executives in manufacturing firms feared cost pressures would soon reach a “tipping point”. [...]
Trump official warns UK on ‘Russia-style’ X ban after Grok row January 11, 2026 A key Trump administration official has sent the UK a firm warning following speculation Elon Musk’s X platform may face a ban after a scandal around AI-generated images. Sarah Rogers, under-secretary for public diplomacy at the US State Department, issued a series of messages criticising the UK on the rumoured ban. Rogers said the UK [...]
Whitehall in talks with City for non-dom reform after exodus January 11, 2026 Whitehall is locked in talks with City bigwigs as the Labour government seeks to attract wealthy investors to the UK following the tumultuous fallout to the scrapping of the non-dom regime. The non-dom status was changed by Chancellor Rachel Reeves in the Autumn Budget 2024 and was swapped for a residence-based system that taxes all [...]