Energy bills set to shrink as oil price plummets January 6, 2015 OIL PRICES continued to fall yesterday, after driving markets down on Monday. Brent crude stayed below $53, the lowest it has been since 2009 and fell to as low as $50.85 during the day. Meanwhile US benchmark WTI remained below what ETX Capital strategist Daniel Sugarman termed the “psychological barrier” of $50 a barrel. Consumers [...]
London Bridge station chaos: Government tells rail bosses to fix “unacceptable” situation urgently January 6, 2015 Ministers in the Department for Transport have warned bosses at Network Rail that they must deal with “unacceptable” chaos at London Bridge station urgently. In a meeting between government officials and rail bosses yesterday morning, aides made clear that the delays and overcrowding seen at the central London station this week must not continue, as [...]
General Election 2015: Party leaders will not deliver spending cuts, economists warn January 6, 2015 Neither the Conservatives nor Labour will be able to deliver the spending cuts they have promised for the next parliament, a group of economists warned yesterday. Oxford Economics has adjusted its macroeconomic forecasts to assume that cuts will be reined in, whoever wins the election in 2015. “The scale of the planned cuts to departmental [...]
Boehner re-elected as speaker in America January 6, 2015 JOHN Boehner, pictured above with congresswoman Nancy Pelosi, narrowly won a third term as House of Representatives Speaker yesterday, surviving a stiff challenge from 25 conservative Republicans that may signal a growing split in the party.
Waitrose pulls Christmas cracker as online shoppers boost sales January 6, 2015 THINGS may be bleak for the big four supermarkets, but for the smaller, challenger businesses initial signs are that Christmas was a real cracker. Waitrose has topped off a strong year, in which it had grown market share to five per cent by December, according to figures published yesterday. The upmarket grocer, which is part [...]
Record trading brings festive cheer to retailer House of Fraser January 6, 2015 HOUSE of Fraser has posted a record Christmas, buoyed by Black Friday and strong online sales, lifting expectations for the department store group’s full-year results. Like-for-like sales for the six weeks to 3 January rose eight per cent, with online sales up 31.2 per cent while sales from bricks and mortar stores rose 4.2 per [...]
Supermarket price wars: Sainsbury’s and Asda kick off new cost-cutting battle January 6, 2015 Asda and J Sainsbury fired the latest salvo yesterday in the supermarket price war, with Tesco also expected to launch a round of price cuts tomorrow as the big four battle it out to win over shoppers’ loyalty. Walmart-owned Asda pledged to spend £300m lowering prices in the first quarter of 2015 as part of [...]
On A Roll! Rolls Royce breaks sales record January 6, 2015 LUXURY car manufacturer Rolls Royce has broken its own sales record for the fifth time in a row, selling 4,063 cars last year, an increase of 12 per cent. The UK-based company is owned by BMW and is said to be considering designing a four-wheel drive vehicle.
CES 2015: The internet of things is coming soon says Samsung’s UK boss Andy Griffiths January 6, 2015 Samsung’s UK boss tells Oliver Smith in Las Vegas that self-controlling central heating and self-parking cars are around the corner Will internet-connected devices change your life over the next five years? Samsung, along with most of the other tech giants in the convention halls of Las Vegas where the global tech industry has amassed this [...]
Retailers expect 2015 to be yet another year of falling prices January 6, 2015 Britain’s retailers expect shop prices to continue to fall throughout this year, having dipped during every month of 2014. Together with falling energy costs, lower prices in the UK’s shops would put more downward pressure on inflation. As a consequence, real wages are expected to rise further, and the Bank of England could be tempted [...]
