Carillion lands Sunderland contract worth a potential £800m November 29, 2013 Construction services company Carillion has been selected by Sunderland city council to form a strategic partnership and deliver a range of property services for the city's regeneration plan. The contract will focus on the redevelopment of sites across the city, worth £100m in the first eight years and potentially £800m over the next 20 years. [...]
Hammerson announces $443m US placement November 29, 2013 British property development and investment company Hammerson has announced a deal with nine US institutions for a placement of $443m (£271m). The placement will come in the form of seven 10 and 12 year notes, which will come in two tranches during 2014. The sale will in part fund the company's upcoming bond maturities including [...]
Lloyds Banking Group appoints new executive director November 29, 2013 Lloyds Banking Group has announced the appointment of Juan Colombas as executive director. Colombas will take up the position 29 November 2013. Chairman, Sir Winfried Bischoff, commenting on today's announcement said: We are delighted to welcomeJuan to the Board. Juan has significant banking and risk management experience. He has served as the Group's Chief Risk [...]
Government urges energy companies to freeze prices until 2015 November 29, 2013 The coalition has called on the big six energy companies to freeze their prices until 2015. According to Sky news sources, energy secretary Ed Davey has written to the country's six largest energy companies asking them to freeze their prices until the general election. Should there be no dramatic rise in the wholesale price of [...]
Bitcoin breaks new boundaries by slashing cost of remittances November 28, 2013 Bitcoin continues to break new boundaries as Kenyan start-up BitPesa, announced it will be going head-to-head with money transfer services such as Western Union by using the virtual currency Bitcoin to cut transaction costs for remittances. Established providers such as Western Union deduct between $10 (£6) to $17 (£10) from a wire transfer of $200 [...]
Marston’s sells over 200 pubs as profits rise November 28, 2013 Marston's brewery has sold 202 pubs to NewRiver Retail for £90m.158 pubs will come from Marston's Taverns estate while 44 are leased pubs. The world's largest brewer of cask ale made the announcement in its preliminary results for 2013. For the year ended 5 October, pre-tax profits for the company rose by one per cent [...]
John Laing Infrastructure Fund completes acquisition of Kelowna & Vernon Hospitals project November 28, 2013 John Laing Infrastructure Fund (JLIF) has completed its acquisition of a 50 per cent shareholding in the Kelowna & Vernon Hospitals P3 project. In October the company successfully raised £242m of capital, the largest in the fund's history. The Kelowna & Vernon Hospitals project is JLIF's third investment in the Canadian secondary P3 market to [...]
Wolseley build on economic recovery as revenue rises November 28, 2013 Mulitnational building company Wolseley has seen a like-for-like revenue increase of 3.5 per cent reaching £3.4bn for the three months to 31 October. USA like-for-like revenue growth stood at 7.6 per cent as key businesses continued to take market share. Revenue of the ongoing businesses was 7.4 per cent ahead of last year while trading [...]
Weak French economy leaves Kingfisher with flat sales November 28, 2013 Kingfisher has seen flat sales for the 13 weeks ended 2 November, due to a poorly performing French economy. Profits in France dropped by 5.6 per cent over the period. The owner of B&Q and Screwfix saw like-for-like sales in France of £1.17bn. Analysts at Deutsche Bank had expected a sales increase of 0.3 per [...]
OECD urges massive deregulation of Greek economy November 27, 2013 The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) has called for Greece to abolish a slew of outdated regulations which are holding back growth. The OECD recommends that 550 regulations with regard to retail, tourism and the food processing industry among others, should be scrapped. The industries identified as being in need of deregulation could [...]
