Simon Collins wins vote for KPMG chair March 12, 2012 KPMG’s new UK chairman elect Simon Collins yesterday vowed to put his firm at the centre of the debate on how to win back trust in the financial services sector, as he celebrated his election victory against two better known rivals Oliver Tant and Alan Buckle. Collins, who is currently global head of KPMG’s transactions [...]
United Biscuits owners revive talks to break up the business March 12, 2012 THE OWNERS of United Biscuits, which makes brands including KP Nuts and McVitie’s, have revived talks with banks over options for its savoury snacks arm, including a potential sale of the business. Private equity groups Blackstone and PAI Partners have appointed Credit Suisse to look at separating its biscuits arm from its crisps and nuts [...]
Spain to miss goals as Italy hits recession March 12, 2012 SPAIN will be allowed to break the terms of the new fiscal compact, it was announced last night, as Eurozone peer Italy officially sank into recession. Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy (pictured) successfully persuaded the other Eurozone leaders at the Eurogroup that it is only missing its deficit targets because the country is mired in [...]
Debt holders lining up for lawsuit over risk warning March 12, 2012 INVESTORS who claim banks failed to warn them of the risks involved in buying Greek debt are to try and sue the government and banks involved, it was announced yesterday. Lawyers in Germany representing 110 investors have formed a class action group. Most of the investors involved spent between €100,000 (£84,116) and €500,000 on Greek [...]
Leaders give green light to bailout plan March 12, 2012 EUROZONE leaders approved the €130bn (£109.3bn) Greek bailout package yesterday, after private sector investors were forced to take major losses on their holdings of the government’s debt. Last week investors accounting for 85.8 per cent of the private sector’s holdings agreed to take a 53.5 per cent write-down, and an additional 9.9 per cent were [...]
Greece’s brand new long-term bonds fail to attract investors March 12, 2012 MARKETS are pricing in another Greek default as trading in its brand new long-term bonds opened at a discount of over 75 per cent yesterday. Athens announced that it has completed the largest debt restructuring in history yesterday as it swapped €177bn (£149bn) worth of bonds for a mix of new instruments including long-dated Greek-law [...]
Game teeters on the brink of insolvency March 12, 2012 GAME shares plunged as much as 78 per cent yesterday to just three quarters of a penny after it was unable to assure investors that the value of its shares could be redeemed or grown. Just weeks after renegotiating its banking covenants, Game said it was “uncertain” whether any of the solutions being discussed with [...]
Mashable’s Scottish chief stands to gain if CNN buys his tech site March 12, 2012 YET another British entrepreneur has been forced to look beyond the UK’s coastline for cash, as reports suggest Pete Cashmore is about to sell his technology blog website Mashable to American broadcaster CNN. The deal, which would see the Time Warner-owned news website buy Mashable for more than $200m (£128m), could be announced as early as [...]
RBS investors set to sue bank over crisis March 12, 2012 A GROUP representing investors in Royal Bank of Scotland plans legal action to recover at least £2.4bn lost when they bought shares in the bank shortly before it fell victim to the financial crisis. Mike Neill, who is coordinating the legal action on behalf of the RBoS Shareholders Action Group, said yesterday the claim was [...]
Oriel makes staffing cuts March 12, 2012 ORIEL Securities yesterday trimmed its workforce by around 10 per cent in response to the uncertain market conditions that have hit so many of the City’s financial services firms. “[I]t is important that the firm’s cost base is efficiently managed and this has, regrettably, resulted in a number of redundancies,” said the firm. Unlike some [...]
