British Land sells shopping centre January 22, 2014 British Land said yesterday it has sold its Eastgate Shopping Centre in Basildon to property investment group Infrared Capital Partners for £88.6m. The 700,000 square feet shopping centre is anchored by an Asda supermarket and a Debenhams department store, and also has two office buildings and a 696 space multi-storey car park. Head of retail [...]
Blur Group’s high value projects up January 22, 2014 Online services exchange Blur Group yesterday said it is seeing an accelerating trend towards more high value, longer duration projects, of which $50m (£30m) worth were submitted from September to December 2013. The company said that its revenue during 2014 is expected to be in line with expectations.
City Moves for 23 January 2014 | Who’s switching jobs January 22, 2014 Legal & General Martin Brookes has joined Legal & General Capital as director of investment strategy. He previously spent 27 years at the Prudential, where he was most recently director of portfolio management in its portfolio management group. KPMG The professional services firm has appointed Victor Abrams as a special adviser in its tax value chain management [...]
Best of the Brokers for 23 January 2014 January 22, 2014 To appear in Best of the Brokers, email your research to notes@cityam.com MICRO FOCUS INTERNATIONAL Panmure Gordon keeps the IT group at a “buy” rating with a target of 851p. The broker says Micro Focus is “sailing along nicely”, with a solid 10.1 per cent dividend yield, and that investors should take advantage of a [...]
London Report: Interest rate hike threat takes shine off FTSE’s bull run January 22, 2014 THE UK’S FTSE 100 eased off eight month highs yesterday after strong jobs data raised the spectre of interest rate hikes and analysts highlighted concerns about companies’ weak earnings and high valuations. Data showed the unemployment rate dropped to 7.1 per cent in the three months to November, below even the most optimistic analyst forecast [...]
New York Report: Wall St hit by weak results January 22, 2014 THE S&P 500 closed flat yesterday as as a mixed bag of corporate earnings failed to give investors the confidence to push equities higher with the index near record levels. For the second day in a row, the Dow posted outsized losses following weak results from one of its components while the Nasdaq climbed, with [...]
Why it will take real bank reform to rid us of our addiction to candy floss credit January 22, 2014 GROWTH is back. Unemployment is falling. Each week seems to bring a flurry of upgraded forecasts. The mood of the pundits has gone from gloom to boom. But headline growth figures do not tell the full story. They only tell us about headline growth. Any government can raise output – and all other kinds of [...]
The Bank must at least discuss a rate rise: Its credibility is now on the line January 22, 2014 THE BANK of England must give serious consideration to raising interest rates. This doesn’t mean it should hike rates immediately. But the conditions under which rates would rise need to be clarified urgently. Forward guidance is being used to avoid this conversation. Ideally, guidance should be employed to reduce the discretion of policymakers over monetary [...]
A crisis of confidence is curbing SME lending and harming recovery January 22, 2014 CONFIDENCE can be the difference between success and failure. For some time, there has been a large number of businesses that are too pessimistic about their chances of getting the finance they need from their bank to grow. I can understand this mindset. These are people battling to keep on top of everything you have [...]
Letters to the Editor – 23/01 – Pensions crisis, Best of Twitter January 22, 2014 Pensions crisis [Re: Brits Told: Save Six Times More For Your Pension or Face Poverty, yesterday] Policy Exchange’s report highlights the pension poverty the British public will face unless a radical change in our savings culture occurs. But the shortfall of auto-enrolment is its mandatory nature, which drives apathy. Abolishing opt-outs will not solve the [...]
