Germans harden opposition to eurobonds before key summit May 21, 2012 GERMANY remains opposed to the introduction of jointly-backed eurobonds to tackle the Eurozone’s sovereign debt crisis, a government spokesman announced yesterday. New French President Francois Hollande and some other Eurozone leaders are expected to revive proposals for mutualised European debt or eurobonds at an informal EU summit in Brussels tomorrow evening. By gaining German backing [...]
CONSTRUCTION SLUMP HITS GROWTH OUTLOOK May 21, 2012 CONSTRUCTION output in the Eurozone fell sharply in the year to March, official figures showed yesterday, delivering a blow to ECB president Mario Draghi, and underlining the weakness of the economy. Production in the sector dropped 3.8 per cent compared with the same month of 2011, according to Eurostat, while output for the EU as [...]
UK raised taxes while other EU states cut back May 21, 2012 BRITAIN’S income taxes jumped sharply at a time when much of the rest of Europe was reducing the burden on high earners, official statistics showed yesterday. Even in corporation tax, where George Osborne aims to make the UK more competitive, other countries have cut taxes further and faster than Britain, leaving the UK’s rate above [...]
London not yet in the race for Facebook type flotations May 21, 2012 WITH financial markets in a state of nervousness, the $104bn Facebook flotation appeared to be a godsend for the few investment banks involved. So far this year, investment banks’ equity advisory teams have had a pretty rotten time. The year all started promisingly enough, with the Italian bank Unicredit managing to get a £6bn rights [...]
CWW points to poor results to back Voda bid May 21, 2012 BRITISH telecoms firm Cable & Wireless Worldwide said yesterday a drop in earnings and no prospect of a quick upturn showed it was right to back a £1bn takeover by Vodafone despite the reluctance of its largest shareholder. The troubled corporate telecoms service provider reported core earnings fell 14 per cent to £378m in the [...]
British Land’s asset value up as retail drags May 21, 2012 BRITISH LAND said yesterday there was little rise in its net asset value in the fourth quarter of the year after weak consumer sentiment caused the value of its retail portfolio to drop. The UK’s second largest property company posted a net asset value of 595p, up from 593p in the three months to 31 [...]
ANALYST VIEWS | HOW IS BRITISH LAND PLACED FOR GROWTH COMPARED TO RIVALS? May 21, 2012 ALISON WATSON LIBERUM CAPITAL A solid set of results. The NAV of 595p was broadly in line with our 592p forecast. The underlying portfolio grew 2.6 per cent (Land Secs two per cent) with a slowdown in growth in the second half. The key driver was the achievement of a number of important milestones in [...]
Waterstones to stack Kindles on its shelves May 21, 2012 WATERSTONES yesterday unveiled a partnership with Amazon that will see the iconic British bookshop sell the Kindle e-reader and e-books. The high street retailer, which celebrates its 30th birthday this year, said the deal is part of its major refurbishment programme, which will see its stores decked out with new coffee shops, free wifi access and [...]
Publishers need to learn lessons of the record industry May 21, 2012 IN my less cynical moments I feel sorry for the record labels. While I think they are almost entirely to blame for destroying huge swathes of their own industry, they did so unwittingly. Their abject failure to respond to the digital music revolution that occurred in the early part of this century means the recorded [...]
US trial of ex-Goldman board member begins May 21, 2012 A FORMER Goldman Sachs Group board member “threw away his duties” in divulging secrets about the investment bank to now-imprisoned hedge fund manager Raj Rajaratnam, a US prosecutor said at the start of a major insider-trading trial yesterday. Rajat Gupta, once a boldface name in business and charity circles, is the most prominent corporate executive [...]
