Oxford Street scheme wins consent August 7, 2013 Great Portland Estates won planning consent from Westminster City Council on Tuesday night to redevelop 73-89 Oxford Street, a retail and office block near Tottenham Court Road. The plans make provision for 88,100 square feet of new retail and office space. Great Portland expects to kick-start work on the building in the first half of [...]
Grainger sells £58.4m Tilt portfolio August 7, 2013 Grainger yesterday sold some 300 homes in East Dulwich known as the Tilt portfolio to the GRIP Unit Trust, a privately rented residential property fund it formed with APG, Europe’s largest pension fund manager this year. In an interim statement yesterday Grainger said the sale for £58.4m will help to repay debt, which currently stands [...]
Best of the brokers for 8 August 2013 August 7, 2013 To appear in Best of the Brokers, email your research to notes@cityam.com MILLENNIUM & COPTHORNE Jefferies maintains its “hold” recommendation and 510p price target on the hotel chain, despite quarterly results which were worse than the broker’s forecasts. Jefferies warns that a slowdown in performance in Asia will continue, but is upbeat about the firm’s [...]
City Moves for 8 August 2013 | Who’s switching jobs August 7, 2013 Lombard The asset finance provider has announced the appointment of Richard Hemsley as managing director. He was most recently at RBS, where he was chief logistics officer in its international banking division. Speechly Bircham Victoria Younghusband has joined the City law firm as a partner in its financial services and funds team. Younghusband specialises in [...]
London Report: FTSE slumps to 4-week low on tightening fears August 7, 2013 THE FTSE 100 share index closed at a four-week low yesterday on concerns the Bank of England (BoE) and the US Federal Reserve may start tightening monetary policy earlier than expected. A day after two Fed officials suggested the US central bank may cut the pace of bond purchases as early as next month, the [...]
New York Report: Wall St drops again on doubt over Fed policy August 7, 2013 US stocks fell for a third straight day yesterday on growing concerns over the longevity of the Federal Reserve’s stimulus policy, which has been widely credited with fuelling the market’s gains this year. Even after shares suffered their biggest decline since 24 June on Tuesday, the market was unable to shake off comments from a [...]
Mark Carney’s promise of prolonged low interest rates risks being broken August 7, 2013 THERE is a wind of change blowing through the Bank of England with new governor Mark Carney at the helm. Under his two predecessors – Eddie George and Mervyn King – the Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) was always very reluctant to make commitments about its future policy. The view was that the Committee would reassess [...]
A ban on zero hours contracts would be damaging to our economic recovery August 7, 2013 WE FEEL no need to excuse businesses that are doing all they can to create jobs. Those who have this week labelled zero hours contracts abusive have completely missed the point. In uncertain times, firms face tough decisions on the risks – on inventory, expansion, staff – they are willing to take. Employers will only [...]
Forward guidance falls short of a strictly rules-based monetary policy August 7, 2013 ALMOST everyone will be disappointed by governor Mark Carney’s announcement yesterday. Those hoping the Bank of England would announce more monetary easing will feel let down. And while those of us hoping for strictly rules-based policy do have something to be happy about, Carney needed to go much further. The Bank has now spelled out [...]
Letters to the editor – 08/08 – Credibility void, Productivity trend, Best of Twitter August 7, 2013 Credibility void [Re: Economic data picks up but the Bank must clarify its position on inflation, yesterday] The author is right that the Bank of England has lost credibility. But it was not so long ago that the Bank adhered to targets regardless of circumstance. When recession struck in the 1980s and 1990s, it took [...]