Pressure on Osborne to ignore ICB August 29, 2011 PRESSURE mounted on George Osborne last night not to push through with the radical banking reforms that will be recommended by Sir John Vickers next month. The Independent Commission on Banking (ICB) has already suggested the retail arms of British banks should be ringfenced from their other activities. Angela Knight, head of the British Bankers’ [...]
New York gets back to work August 29, 2011 IT was business as usual in New York yesterday after the feared battering from hurricane Irene was less severe than previously expected. The death-toll hit 30 last night, as residents began to count the cost of the damage. Analysts say the total bill could be as high as $7bn (£4.3bn), with less than half of [...]
Irene’s not all she is made out to be August 29, 2011 IN the end Hurricane Irene turned out to be mercifully less destructive than feared. Many New Yorkers were able to be at their desks yesterday after all, even after the dire warnings of Mayor Bloomberg who had ordered a mandatory evacuation of 370,000 people in low-lying areas. Bloomberg is being criticised for being alarmist, but [...]
WHAT THE OTHER PAPERS SAY THIS MORNING August 29, 2011 FINANCIAL TIMES WATCHDOG HITS OUT AT BANKS OVER GREEK DEBT Some European financial institutions should have taken bigger losses on their Greek government bond holdings in recent results announcements, according to the body that sets their accounting rules. the International Accounting Standards Board criticised the inconsistent way in which banks and insurers have been writing [...]
Gaddafi family flees to Algeria August 29, 2011 The wife of Muammar Gaddafi and other members of his family took refuge in Algeria yesterday but the whereabouts of the fugitive former strongman himself remained a mystery, a week after rebels drove him from power. Algeria’s Foreign Ministry said Gaddafi’s wife Safia, his daughter Aisha and his sons Hannibal and Mohammed had entered Algeria [...]
Italy drops austerity measures August 29, 2011 The Italian government backtracked on parts of its widely criticised austerity package yesterday, scrapping a tax on high earners and scaling back cuts to local authority funding. In a statement after seven hours of talks at prime minister Silvio Berlusconi’s home at Arcore outside Milan, the government said ministers had reached unanimous decisions on the [...]
Greek banks merger leads market rally August 29, 2011 SHARES in two of Greece’s major lenders soared yesterday after they announced plans for a full-scale merger that will create the region’s biggest bank by assets. Alpha Bank and EFG Eurobank saw their stock leap 26 per cent and 29 per cent respectively, with their rivals’ share prices also rising as investors welcomed the prospect [...]
New company must halt deposit flight August 29, 2011 WHILE European leaders spent a day fulminating about IMF chief Christine Lagarde’s call for the region’s banks to raise more capital, the banks themselves were simply getting on with the job. Keen to avoid tapping the state for cash, EFG Eurobank and Alpha Bank have agreed a tie-up that will create a lender with 1,300 [...]
BofA sells half of CCB shares August 29, 2011 BANK OF America is selling half of its holdings in China Construction Bank to a group of unidentified investors for $8.3bn (£5.1bn), in a deal which marks the troubled bank’s latest efforts to shed assets and boost capital. The US bank, which owns the highly renowned investment bank Merrill Lynch, declined to name the purchasers [...]
Healthcare Locums pushes fundraising despite opposition August 29, 2011 TROUBLED medical staff provider Healthcare Locums has vowed to press ahead with its £60m emergency fundraising despite rebel investors claiming they have won enough support for it to be blocked. Sources at the firm denied the suggestion by US hedge fund Arundel Capital that more than a fifth of shareholders oppose the plan, which would [...]
