By: Christian May

Editor-in-Chief Christian May is the Editor-in-Chief of City AM. He served in the role from 2015 to 2020 and returned in 2024. He writes the daily Editor's Letter for print and online and releases The Week in Business roundup video each Thursday. He is particularly interested in the health of London's capital markets, economic policy, politics, regulation and business activity in the City of London. He regularly appears in the broadcast media and presents a daily Business News slot on LBC at 0730, Monday to Friday. Find Christian on X and LinkedIn.

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All 521 Articles

Boris Johnson needs to deliver his own Mario Draghi moment

March 16, 2020

At the start of a crisis, especially one as alien and as fast-moving as the Covid-19 pandemic, governments can count on a certain amount of public support. Quite a high amount, in fact, as has been born out by recent polling revealing high levels of approval for the government’s handling of things so far. But [...]
Our ability to overcome should never be in doubt

March 16, 2020

We are being told to prepare for significant changes to our way of life. Within weeks, perhaps sooner, the government will require anyone over the age of 70 to stay in their homes. The health secretary, Matt Hancock, says that when the order comes it will last “for a very long time”, while Public Health [...]
We’re going to have to help each other out

March 13, 2020

Major events of the kind that come to be seen as era-defining tend, over time, to attract a simple question: “Where were you when you heard it?” The assassination of JFK, the death of Princess Diana and 9/11 are just a few examples, and it’s reasonable to assume that to this list Brits may add [...]
Splash the cash and hope for the best

March 12, 2020

He didn’t look or sound like a man who had only been chancellor for a matter of weeks. It would have been a difficult debut outing in good times, but delivering an emergency Budget — just hours after an emergency rate cut — would test the mettle of a seasoned parliamentary grandee. The delivery was [...]
Rebel platoon gives government a scare

March 11, 2020

Despite the best efforts of the government, today’s Budget will be the Coronavirus Budget. As much as Downing Street wants to refocus the conversation — even for a day — on its “levelling up” agenda, attention will inevitably fall on the chancellor’s economic antidote to the effects of the outbreak. But it isn’t just ministers [...]
Government bides its time as markets panic

March 10, 2020

When sorrows come, they come not single spies but in battalions. Global markets were already nervous about the looming consequences of the coronavirus pandemic, so Saudi Arabia’s declaration of an oil price war obliterated what little confidence remained on trading floors around the globe. Oil prices had already fallen as the virus took a bite [...]
Chancellor faces tough job as virus fears grow

March 9, 2020

Sajid Javid never got to deliver a Budget, and now his successor will this week unveil one of the most important in decades. Wednesday’s statement was meant to be a showpiece for a government determined to “level-up” the economy and flex its newly-won Commons majority. While ministers are still hoping to regain some political initiative [...]
It’s on: Khan v Bailey will be a chance to scrutinise the leading candidates

March 6, 2020

Four years ago I chaired the first head- to-head debate between the mayoral candidates Sadiq Khan and Zac Goldsmith. It was a dramatic encounter, with the Labour candidate (and current London mayor) laying into his rival for the Tory campaign’s descent “into the gutter.” Just days before the debate, Goldsmith had launched a stinging attack [...]
New Bank governor seems open to battle of ideas

March 5, 2020

Andrew Bailey will take the governor’s seat at the Bank of England later this month amid a global health emergency that threatens to undermine the world economy and shape the Bank’s course of action for many months to come. So pressing is the issue that Bailey has effectively started work early, telling the Treasury Select [...]
The world’s biggest economy is scared

March 4, 2020

The final weeks of 2019 saw the traditional flurry of analysts and market commentators raising the prospect of so-called black swan events in 2020. Looking back through these notes today, one is confronted with a range of nightmare scenarios ranging from military conflict in the South China Sea to the collapse of a major investment bank [...]

Sarwar says Starmer welcome on campaign trail despite resignation call

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Valentine’s Day: Fancy a romantic bowl of chocolate spaghetti?

By: Christian May

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