EDF’s UK network sale hits snag June 14, 2010 French utility EDF’s long-running sale of its £4bn UK electricity networks hit a snag yesterday when a bidder said it would need to spend “a lot more” than originally planned upgrading the networks. Hongkong Electric and sister company Cheung Kong Infrastructure had been vying for the assets with two consortiums – Scottish & Southern Energy, [...]
HSBC appoints Booker as US chief June 14, 2010 HSBC has promoted its North American deputy chief to chief executive of the region, from the beginning of August. Niall Booker, who also joins the group management board, originally started at HSBC in 1981 and has previously worked for the bank in the Middle East and India.
Goldwind IPO in Hong Kong is cancelled June 14, 2010 CHINA’S second-largest wind turbine maker, Xinjiang Goldwind Science & Technology, has pulled its up-to-$1.2bn (£814m) initial public offering, the fifth Hong Kong IPO shelved since last month. With around $3.8bn in public offerings pulled from the Hong Kong Stock Exchange in the last few weeks, the dead deals reveal the impact of the sharp drop [...]
Fortunes can be made in times of austerity June 14, 2010 PEOPLE who come from poorer backgrounds with little money have a huge advantage in creating something of value: the only way is up. That was the assessment of John O’Connell, the founder of Britain’s Staffware and one of Ariadne Capital’s founding shareholders, when he spoke at a Fredericks Foundation conference recently. He said, half jokingly, [...]
RBC looks for City targets June 14, 2010 Royal Bank of Canada said it would consider buying a London-based boutique investment bank to speed its expansion efforts, after unveiling plans yesterday to hire 75 more staff across Europe. RBC Capital Markets said it had already hired over 560 people since the start of its financial year in November, including 140 in Europe. Canada’s [...]
OECD: Bailouts distort investment June 14, 2010 Emergency bailouts by governments to cope with the financial crisis have distorted investment flows and should be scaled back as soon as it is safe to do so, an international report released yesterday said. But the UN Conference on Trade and Development and Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) also found that regular investment [...]
Business confidence falls June 14, 2010 Business confidence among British firms has seen its biggest drop since 1995 due to the government’s rhetoric on spending cuts, a survey suggests. The Business Trends survey from accountants BDO fell to 97 in May from 103.3 the previous month – the largest drop since the survey began. BDO said economic growth forecasts for this [...]
CITY VIEWS: WHAT did you make OF THE OFFICE for BUDGET RESPONSIBILITY’S REPORT TODAY? June 14, 2010 KAREN HEFFER | 85 DESIGN AGENCY “The Treasury didn’t necessarily get the figures wrong. Maybe there was a bit of creativity with the figures, in advance of the election. It didn’t matter to them because they weren’t going to be around to mop up the mess. But these figures are too important to be used [...]
International raiders set to steal the show on Ascot’s opening day June 14, 2010 FIVE days of quality racing gets underway this afternoon with arguably the race of the week, the Queen Anne Stakes. Last year’s winner Paco Boy meets multiple Group One winners GOLDIKOVA and Rip Van Winkle in a mouth-watering clash. My slight preference is for the French wonder mare who last month won the eighth Group [...]
HONDA STRIKE CHAOS CONTINUES June 14, 2010 HONDA workers at the car company’s Chinese factories downed tools yesterday. The workers, who have been in dispute with the company over pay, have walked out three times in the past month.
