WHAT THE OTHER PAPERS SAY THIS MORNING March 6, 2011 FINANCIAL TIMES TESCO PUSH ON MUSIC GROUPS’ CD DEALS Tesco is pushing music companies to accept minimal upfront payments for the compact discs they ship to the Uk retailer, in a renegotiation that will test how record labels’ bargaining power has diminished in line with shoppers’ interest in CDs. Instead of paying £7 or £8 [...]
UK families worst off for tax March 6, 2011 Traditional UK families with one working parent get the worst tax deal in the world, according to a new survey. A study for the Christian social policy charity CARE found Britain topped the world league table for the highest tax burden on a married earner with two children, compared to a single person on the [...]
Polygon offers an exit price March 6, 2011 Polygon Capital is offering investors 72 cents on the dollar to withdraw from the fund. The offer comes three years after the near collapse of the hedge fund, which faced a $7.5bn (£4.6bn) loss in 2008. According to the Financial Times, Polygon has sent a letter to investors advising them of the offer. Last May [...]
Cameron: I’ve got a plan for UK enterprise March 6, 2011 PRIME Minister David Cameron made a bid to convince the public that his government has a plan for growth as well as deficit reduction in a speech at his party’s spring conference in Cardiff yesterday. Re-branding the coalition “an enterprise government”, Cameron declared war on “the enemies of enterprise” for “taxing, regulating, smothering, crushing, getting [...]
CBI calls for land auctions to boost growth March 6, 2011 THE government should introduce “growth zones” to parts of the country that have become overly reliant on government funds in recent years, the Confederation for British Industry (CBI) said today. The group, which represents 240,000 businesses, called for de-regulation of some green belt areas, and land auctions in single areas, to stimulate growth. It said [...]
Shareholders query London base for HSBC March 6, 2011 HSBC shareholders are becoming increasingly restless over the bank’s domicile, with the UK bank levy a particular bugbear due to the proportion of its incomes earned abroad. The bank has said that the levy will cost it $600m (£369m) this year, between the £315m and £390m forecasts for RBS and Barclays respectively, despite HSBC deriving [...]
Industry dismayed by Mervyn King as Bank eyes new powers March 6, 2011 THE banking community has reacted with “dismay” to comments by Bank of England governor Mervyn King that the industry exploits gullible borrowers and has failed to learn the lessons of the credit crisis. “Mervyn King’s comments are extremely unhelpful,” a senior banker told City A.M. “The reaction of the business community is dismay. I don’t know [...]
Hawks look to end two years of 0.5pc rates March 6, 2011 INTEREST rates have been held at a historical low of 0.5 per cent for two years this week, as the Bank of England meets to decide whether to begin normalising policy. Hawkish sentiment is on the rise in 2011, with two members of the Bank’s monetary policy committee (MPC) joining Andrew Sentance’s call for monetary [...]
ECONOMISTS’ VIEWS: HOW LIKELY IS A RISE IN INTEREST RATES THIS WEEK? March 6, 2011 SCOTT CORFE | CEBR “Our central view is that the MPC will wait until April or May – when economic growth in Q1 2011 and the contents of the March Budget are known – before raising rates. The downward revision of GDP for the fourth quarter of 2010 strengthens the case for the MPC to [...]
Virgin Money eyes stricken N&P business March 6, 2011 BUYERS are lining up for beleaguered building society Norwich & Peterborough, as it attempts to grapple with the fallout of a Financial Ombudsman Service ruling against it. Sir Richard Branson’s fledgling Virgin Money financial services business has been linked with the firm and is said to be in advanced takeover talks. Led by Jayne-Anne Gadhia, [...]
