Great Portland Estates seals £6m of rents July 3, 2014 GREAT Portland Estates said yesterday it had secured 117,000 square feet of lettings in the first quarter of the year, generating £6.1m of annual rent, after drawing big tenants to its West End schemes. The property developer completed 22 leases during the three months to March, following on from a record year, when it made [...]
Ashley finally set for Sports Direct bonus July 2, 2014 SPORTS Direct triumphed yesterday in pushing through a multimillion-pound bonus share scheme for founder Mike Ashley despite vehement opposition from several shareholder groups. The retail giant’s third attempt at rewarding Ashley, who did not vote, was backed by 60.4 per cent of investors – overcoming opponents to the scheme such as Scottish fund manager Standard [...]
Tesco chairman Sir Richard Broadbent flies to Burma to broker F&F clothing deal July 2, 2014 Tesco chairman Sir Richard Broadbent flew to Burma this week to broker a deal that would see it source clothing from the country for its fast-growing clothing brand F&F. Broadbent, who travelled with group commercial director Kevin Grace, is understood to be meeting suppliers and government officials as well opposition leader Aung San Suu Kyi. [...]
Mothercare shares jump on £266m takeover bid July 2, 2014 US RETAILER Destination Maternity yesterday said that it would seek to hold talks with Mothercare’s board after revealing that it has had two takeover proposals rejected by the mother and baby products chain. Destination Maternity said Mothercare had rebuffed its first two written proposals and had “refused to engage” with the firm on its latest [...]
Analyst Views: Was Mothercare right to reject a takeover offer from America? July 2, 2014 MIKE DENNIS | CANTOR FITZGERALD You just have to look at the chairman’s statement to see what’s wrong with the deal – the highly conditional nature and the lack of strategic rationale… Destination Maternity believes Mothercare can help them achieve global leadership? We think this is questionable and we find this difficult to understand. JOHN [...]
Housing market boom helps to boosts demand at Topps Tiles July 2, 2014 TOPPS Tiles yesterday posted a jump in third quarter sales, helped by a buoyant housing market pushing more Britons into upgrading their homes. The tiling specialist, which runs 330 UK stores, said like-for-like revenues rose by 6.3 per cent in the 13 weeks to 28 June compared with a drop of 1.5 per cent in [...]
Persimmon in call for green belt shake-up July 2, 2014 THE CHIEF executive of Britain’s second largest housebuilder said a review of the green belt system was “inevitable” to meet the UK’s housing shortage as the group posted a double-digit surge in revenues. Jeff Fairburn said the green belt was “the last opportunity” to deliver the number of homes the country must build each year [...]
Urban Exposure IPO: Property lender to raise £500m in market float July 2, 2014 A residential property lender yesterday announced plans for a £500m stock market float as it seeks to tap into demand for new homes in London and the south east. Urban Exposure was founded as a property developer in 2002 by former Deutsche Bank risk analyst Randeesh Sandhu, but started providing short-term loans to other [...]
Directors join row over Mike Ashley’s Sports Direct bonus July 1, 2014 British directors yesterday slammed Sports Direct’s plans to hand founder Mike Ashley a multimillion-pound share bonus, which this morning is facing a crunch shareholder vote. The Institute of Directors’ rare attack on Sports Direct criticised “weak governance” from the company’s board over the pay plans. But the retailer last night remained confident of passing the [...]
Morrisons and Tesco lose grip on market share and sales July 1, 2014 Morrisons and Tesco have both suffered another heavy fall in sales and market share in the last 12 weeks despite efforts to slash prices and win customers back into their stores. Data released yesterday from Kantar Worldpanel showed that overall grocery market grew by 2.8 per cent year-on-year in the 12 weeks to 22 June, [...]
