Analyst Views: Have you changed your outlook following Persimmon’s statement? February 25, 2014 CLYDE LEWIS | PEEL HUNT Finals showed a 16 per cent rise in volumes boosting revenues by 21 per cent … the key surprise was the acceleration of the capital return programme. When you are sitting there with a big cash promise, a big land bank and you have delivered good growth it tells you [...]
Capco property values up by a fifth to £2.3bn February 25, 2014 CAPITAL & Counties (Capco) said a strong performance from its sprawling Covent Garden estate helped push the total value of its property up by 20 per cent to £2.3bn last year. The developer, which has been bringing in new upmarket tenants including Dior, Laduree and the restaurant Balthazar, said the value of its west end [...]
MPs find themselves out of a job February 25, 2014 YOU’D be forgiven for thinking access to finance is the biggest issue facing SMEs at the moment – and up until yesterday you were in good company, as MPs very much thought so too. Just last week the Treasury Select Committee launched an investigation into business lending and yesterday held its first evidence session with [...]
GS-Imitator: Man behind tweets is not a Gold-man February 25, 2014 THE SIGH of relief from Goldman Sachs could almost be heard from Canary Wharf to Wall Street yesterday when it was revealed the author behind the insatiably popular @GSElevator Twitter account and soon to be author of a book titled “Straight to Hell: True Tales of Deviance and Excess in the World of Investment Banking”, [...]
Shares jump as BlackBerry says focus is on BBM February 25, 2014 BLACKBERRY chief exec John Chen announced at Mobile World Congress yesterday that the struggling smartphone maker would double down on its BBM messaging service by focusing on enterprise customers. BlackBerry’s share price has risen over 17 per cent since Facebook’s announcement that it would buy messaging app WhatsApp for $19bn (£11.4bn) last week as investors [...]
Bottom Line: This end is really the beginning February 25, 2014 THE DEATH of Bitcoin’s most popular exchange couldn’t have come sooner. The “transaction malleability” bug that hit Mt Gox is a known problem with the crypto-currency, and exchanges failing to take the proper steps will find themselves vulnerable. By the time a fix came, “the damage had already been done”, a document leaked yesterday said. [...]
Mastercard to tackle fraud by tracking users February 25, 2014 MASTERCARD, the world’s second-biggest credit and debit card company, yesterday announced the pilot of a new service to use mobile location data to allow easy card payments for customers who are travelling abroad. The system works by accessing the location data of a mobile phone to make sure that where a credit card is being [...]
Brand Index: WhatsApp needs to translate higher interest into more users February 25, 2014 FACEBOOK chief exec Mark Zuckerberg, speaking at the World Mobile Congress in Barcelona this week, declared that the mobile web is essential to Facebook’s future, and to connecting billions of people living in the developing world. The social media impresario cannot be accused of not putting his money where his mouth is, considering Facebook just [...]
Clifford Chance partners choose Guy Norman as corporate head February 25, 2014 THE LAWYER who advised Kraft on its bid for Cadbury and Barclays on its acquisition of Lehman Brothers’ North American investment bank was yesterday named head of Clifford Chance’s global corporate practice, after an uncontested election. Guy Norman will take over from outgoing corporate head Matthew Layton on 1 May, taking the reins from the man [...]
Coats on the rise but pension row frustrates Guinness Peat February 25, 2014 GUINNESS Peat, the former corporate raider that owns textiles giant Coats, said yesterday it has endured a “frustrating” year as a UK pensions probe prevents the firm from returning cash to shareholders. The London and New Zealand listed company said it was still too early to say how it would address two formal warning notices [...]
