McDonald’s to create 2,500 UK jobs January 24, 2012 McDonald’s will create 2,500 new jobs across the UK this year, it has said. The fast-food firm said that almost a third of the new jobs would be given to workers under the age of 25. McDonald’s said the new jobs followed the creation of 13,500 jobs over the past three years.
Siemens chief warns of impact of Eurozone debt woes January 24, 2012 Europe’s biggest engineering conglomerate Siemens posted an unexpectedly sharp fall in core profits and saw a six-quarter streak of rising orders come to an end as the Eurozone’s debt woes hit corporate spending and investment. Chief executive Peter Loescher warned that 2012 would be a difficult year for Germany’s largest company by market capitalisation, but [...]
Chemring predicts tough 2012 defence market January 24, 2012 British military equipment maker Chemring said it expects defence markets to be challenging in 2012 after it posted a six per cent rise in full-year profit, helped by growth in sales to non-NATO markets. “During the last year, many governments have struggled with increasing deficits and lower economic growth …this has affected defence procurement, leading [...]
Land Securities promotes Noel to chief executive January 24, 2012 Land Securities, Britain’s largest real estate investment trust by market capitalisation, said its London managing director Robert Noel was to take over as chief executive on a salary of 680,000 pounds. Alongside a third-quarter trading statement marking steady progress in difficult economic conditions, the company said current chief executive Francis Salway, 54, would depart on [...]
Newt Gingrich is back from the political dead, and only Mitt Romney can stop him January 23, 2012 AS SOON as Newt Gingrich’s landslide win in South Carolina was announced by US networks, two ideas were put forward as gospel. Firstly, that this was an unexpected sensation – and secondly that, due to the vastness and expense of campaigning in the state, such a sensation would be impossible for him to repeat in [...]
Holy moly: Banks were drugged by Basel’s rulebook January 23, 2012 LET’S suppose that the human, fallible credit rating agencies produce ratings that are absolutely perfect in terms of measuring the risk of default; and that banks use these ratings to choose who to lend to, at what rates and under what conditions. But then let us add that bank regulators, such as those in the [...]
Liquidating false ideas of Austrian economics January 23, 2012 IN A recent article in the Daily Telegraph, Ambrose Evans-Pritchard argued that “policy defeatism is in the air, and Austro-liquidationists are winning the popular debate”. “Austro-liquidationists” is a neat slur, managing to damn Austrian economics as both terrifyingly extreme and stupefyingly technical at the same time. But Evans-Pritchard misrepresents the Austrian school, while also overestimating [...]
RAPID RESPONSES January 23, 2012 Not a capital idea [Re: Why a wealth tax is a very bad idea, yesterday] A mansion tax would require a whole new bureaucracy to value property and collect the tax – a very bad idea. More generally, a wealth tax is bad because it destroys capital. Our collective wealth provides the seedcorn for new [...]
BRUSSELS IN NEW ATTACK ON BANK PAY January 23, 2012 BRUSSELS could make its ultra-strict rulebook on bankers’ pay even harsher, commissioner Michel Barnier said yesterday during a visit to the City. The ideas under consideration include forcing lenders to set a maximum ratio between their most and least highly pay staff and requiring bankers’ fixed base salaries to account for a minimum amount of [...]
Cable’s plan for clawbacks and tougher votes on director pay January 23, 2012 SHAREHOLDERS will be given binding votes on executive directors’ pay as part of coalition plans to reform the corporate landscape. Business secretary Vince Cable, left, said he also wants to make it easier for companies to claw back money from directors if poor performance subsequently emerges. But he dropped plans for workers’ representatives to sit [...]
