…as OECD calls for work plan June 26, 2012 THE LONG spells many Americans are spending without work risk leaving a lasting scar of higher unemployment on the US economy, the OECD warned yesterday. In its biennial report on the US economy, the OECD said the unemployment rate which the economy could sustain without generating inflation was 6.1 per cent, up from 5.7 per [...]
WHO’S SWITCHING JOBS June 26, 2012 Mayer Brown Andrew Block has been appointed as a partner in the pensions group of the law firm. He was previously a partner at Travers Smith, and started his legal career at Linklaters. Block acts in occupational pension scheme matters. He will be based in Mayer Brown’s London office. Manches The law firm has announced [...]
BEST of the BROKERS June 26, 2012 SHIRE Societe Generale has upgraded the pharmaceutical giant from “hold” to “buy” with a reduced target price of 2,192p from the previous 2,310p. Despite the US regulator approving a generic competitor for the company’s Adderall XR drug last week, the broker does not expect multiple generics to be approved from here, so continues to see [...]
FTSE slides on banking shares and scepticism over EU leaders’ summit June 26, 2012 BRITAIN’S top shares dipped into negative territory in a lacklustre session yesterday, hampered by banking stocks, with market movements likely to remain muted ahead of a summit of European leaders later in the week. While a two-day summit in Brussels on 28-29 June was very much the market focus, traders pointed to an element of [...]
US stocks rise after upbeat property data June 26, 2012 MAJOR US stock indexes bounced back yesterday, but trading was light with the outlook clouded by doubts before yet another summit to tackle the European debt crisis. US stocks partly recovered from losses of more than one per cent on Monday, led by housing shares after stronger-than-expected data on home prices. The consumer discretionary sector [...]
Useless PR has turned NatWest’s woes into a corporate nightmare June 26, 2012 FOUR years ago, Stephen Hester was CEO of British Land. Not a company many people know of, let alone its boss. But today, not only is Hester running RBS – one of Britain’s best known banking groups and owners of NatWest – he is a household name. First it was his salary, then it was his [...]
Deficit spending didn’t end the Great Depression and it won’t save us now June 26, 2012 JOHN Maynard Keynes is on many minds at the moment. Lots of talking heads are prescribing a dose of Keynesian medicine: more spending and borrowing. However, Keynes didn’t get us out of the Great Depression and he should be ignored today. The 1930s and the Great Depression are often cited as an exemplar. Some assert [...]
Get ready for an Olympic summer of cyber attacks June 26, 2012 THE headline-grabbing words of warning from MI5 chief, Jonathan Evans, on Monday night dished up a timely reminder that the City could be in for a nervous summer. The comments, detailing the levels of cyber attacks on UK industry, have raised many eyebrows. It was the first speech from Evans in more than two years [...]
Is Lord Oakeshott right that RBS should be split up into a retail and investment bank? June 26, 2012 YES Richard Lloyd The RBS failure has highlighted just how critical basic banking services are to consumers and small businesses. It is crucial that high street banking is protected from instability. Our Future of Banking campaign recommended that essential retail banking services should be ring-fenced to help protect depositors from risk-taking elsewhere within the bank. [...]
RAPID responses June 26, 2012 UK tennis failures [Re: Tennis is booming financially – but the cash is wasted, yesterday] It’s good to read someone is tracking the failures of British tennis. My eight year old son has been playing for three years and support for young players is shockingly inadequate. Most of those parading as coaches add little to [...]
