GOING GREEN AS GREEN GOES AWOL February 8, 2011 “HEAVY business” in the House of Lords detained former HSBC chairman Stephen Green, but the British-Israel Chambers of Commerce partied on anyway last night at the British-Israeli business awards dinner. Universities minister David Willetts stepped into the breach with Green’s speech in hand to extol the UK economy’s virtues as an exporter of everything “from [...]
Xstrata posts $6bn profit as copper soars February 8, 2011 MINER Xstrata beat expectations to more than quadruple its pre-tax profit in 2010, the firm said yesterday, on the back of a runaway rise in commodity prices. Xstrata’s pre-tax profit rose to $6.6bn (£4.1bn) up from $1.53bn a year ago, on revenues that rose 34 per cent to $30.5bn. Copper prices, which have jumped 30 [...]
BG Group offsets production drop with higher gas prices February 8, 2011 GAS explorer BG Group beat analyst forecasts yesterday with a 13 per cent rise in fourth-quarter earnings, with higher gas and oil prices offsetting a dip in production. Earnings for the last three months of 2010 rose 13 per cent to $1.06bn, (£659m) though pre-tax profit fell 2.7 per cent to $1.45bn on last year, [...]
Beazley eyes M&A after stellar results February 8, 2011 LLOYD’S insurer Beazley is still eyeing deals despite paying out $60m (£37.2m) in dividends and keeping a $20m chest for potential share buybacks, chief executive Andrew Horton told City A.M. yesterday. Beazley’s share price rose more than 6.6 per cent to 127.7p after it reported a 60 per cent rise in pre-tax profit and a [...]
Hands joins Chaucer bid fray February 8, 2011 GUY Hands’ Terra Firma buyout house confirmed it was in the bid race for Lloyd’s insurer Chaucer yesterday following feverish speculation over the potential bidders. Sources familiar with the situation told City A.M. that at least one further bidder is also in talks with the insurance company. A US trade buyer is reportedly in takeover [...]
ANALYST VIEWS: DID BEAZLEY’S RESULTS MEET YOUR EXPECTATIONS? February 8, 2011 NICK JOHNSON | NUMIS The return on equity in a difficult year vividly highlights the quality of Beazley’s underwriting. These results will look relatively better and better as its peers report. JOANNA PARSONS | RBS These were good results. We now expect more questions on the group’s strategic aims post-Hardy, as well as its $240m [...]
Senator calls for SEC hack probe February 8, 2011 A key lawmaker called on US securities regulators to work with criminal authorities to crack down on hackers following reports that cyber attackers have repeatedly tried to break into trading systems run by Nasdaq OMX Group. Senator Bob Menendez, a Democrat from New Jersey and a member of the Senate Banking Committee, sent a letter [...]
US enviro review of drilling February 8, 2011 The US Interior Department said yesterday it will conduct a review on the environmental impact of leasing certain oil and natural gas tracts in the Gulf of Mexico as part of its next five-year drilling plan. The environmental impact statement will cover all proposed lease sales that would be held off the coasts of Texas, [...]
WaMu rejigs its bankruptcy plan February 8, 2011 Washington Mutual yesterday scrapped a rights offering after hedge funds pulled out of a settlement at the heart of the company’s latest plan to exit bankruptcy. The company is trying to resolve the criticisms of a bankruptcy court judge, who rejected the previous plan last month. Washington Mutual needs approval so it can begin distributing [...]
Revenue flat at TalkTalk as users leave February 8, 2011 TALKTALK lost 25,000 broadband subscribers in its third quarter, as problems with its labyrinthine merger continued to bite. Billing issues were at least partly responsible for the churn, which left TalkTalk with 4.22m subscribers. However, the firm said this was partly offset by an increase in average revenue per user. Customers spent an average of [...]
