Red Dragons have edge in Twickenham thriller February 23, 2012 ENGLAND vs WALES TOMORROW – 4.00PM BBC ONE THIS is the one many of us have been waiting for. Wales at Twickenham always gets the blood flowing, but there seems to be more at stake this year. It’s the first real test for Stuart Lancaster’s new-look England. The interim coach can be pleased to have [...]
Haadeeth and The Strig look good in Sprint Series Final February 23, 2012 THE Blue Square Sprint Series has been a tremendous initiative over the past two months and tomorrow’s £15,000 Grand Final (2.15pm) looks a cracking contest. All the key protagonists from the Series are lining up and any one of the 12 runners could quite feasibly land the prize. What seems certain is that there will [...]
BLUE SQUARE WINTER CARNIVAL February 23, 2012 AS we’ve taken a detailed look at the Blue Square Sprint Series Grand Final already, we’re going to concentrate on the rest of the card at Lingfield. The bluesquare.com Cleves Stakes (2.50pm) is a Listed contest over six furlongs and, on paper, it looks a match between PALACE MOON and Oasis Dream. I find it [...]
CBI factory orders index hits six-month high February 23, 2012 Britain’s main factory orders index rebounded in February to its highest level in six months, boosting hopes that the economy is on track for recovery, the CBI’s monthly industrial trends survey showed. The Confederation of British Industry survey’s total order book balance jumped to -3 from -16 in January, well above economists’ forecasts of a [...]
Eurozone economy to shrink in 2012 February 23, 2012 The eurozone is heading into its second recession in just three years, while the wider European Union will stagnate, the EU’s executive said on Thursday, warning that the currency area has yet to break its vicious cycle of debt. The Commission forecast that economic output in the 17 nations sharing the euro will contract 0.3 [...]
RBS spearheads banks’ rally on FTSE February 23, 2012 The FTSE staged a rally this morning spearheaded by banks as investors gave a positive reaction to RBS results. Markets yesterday had been dented by surging oil prices which triggered fears that world global growth could be hampered while data in the Eurozone suggested that the bloc could lurch into recession. Banking stocks jumped in [...]
BAT in £1.25bn buy back February 23, 2012 British American Tobacco , the world’s second-biggest cigarette maker, increased its share buyback to £1.25bn ($1.96 billion) after it raised prices and saw strong growth in emerging markets to help boost its annual earnings. The London-based maker of Kent, Dunhill, Lucky Strike and Pall Mall cigarettes completed a share buyback of 750 million pounds in [...]
Credit Agricole posts record loss February 23, 2012 French bank Credit Agricole reported a record quarterly net loss of 3.07bn euros (£2.58bn), performing worse than expected as it was hit by the cost of shrinking its balance sheet and the Greek debt crisis. The semi-cooperative bank, which is under new management and trying to return to its low-risk retail lending roots, was hit [...]
RBS losses widen to £1.8bn February 23, 2012 State-owned Royal Bank of Scotland posted a fourth quarter loss of nearly £2bn, hurt by writedowns on assets and restructuring costs. RBS, 82 per cent owned by the government after a state bailout during the 2008 credit crisis, reported a fourth-quarter loss of £1.8bn, pushing it back into the red after it made a third-quarter [...]
Centrica profits edge up February 23, 2012 British Gas owner Centrica reported a small increase in full-year profit as higher commodity prices and mild weather offset gains in its upstream oil and gas business. The company, however, said it plans to deliver improved earnings growth this year, driven largely by higher oil and gas production. Centrica, which owns Britain’s biggest household energy [...]
