Gartmore wants deal by this week December 19, 2010 FUND manager Gartmore Group wants to agree a rescue package from rival Henderson before the end of the year, after the latter tabled a £344m bid. Henderson is said to have made a conditional offer at 95p a share, made up of cash and shares, say people familiar with the talks. An offer pitched at [...]
Fund manager loses twinkle December 19, 2010 JUST under one year ago, Roger Guy and Guillaume Rambourg were crowned fund managers of the year at a swanky black tie gala at London’s Grosvenor House Hotel. Six months later their worlds fell apart. Rambourg quit, followed last month by Roger Guy. Three others have also handed in their notice. An exodus of top [...]
BEST OF THE BROKERS December 19, 2010 WOLSELEY Standard & Poor’s has initiated coverage of the building products company with a “hold” rating and a 12-month target price of £19.50. The broker notes that Wolseley has lowered its headcount and number of branches drastically since the downturn, and expects a return to profitability in 2011. ASTRAZENECA Evolution Securities rates the pharmaceutical group [...]
Green power firm raises £10m December 19, 2010 Green energy company Ecotricity attracted more than 1,800 potential investors to its £10m bond sale, the firm announced at the weekend. Ecotricity hopes to build sun and wind farms with the proceeds from the sale, which was oversubscribed by 50 per cent. Three quarters of the investors are existing customers, who will receive better rates [...]
Berkeley buys Aldgate site December 19, 2010 Housebuilder Berkeley Group has bought a seven acre regeneration site in Aldgate from receiver BNP Paribas Real Estate for an undisclosed sum. The Goodman’s Field site has planning permission for 754 homes, over 600 student beds, a hotel and more than 100,000 square feet of office space, and was previously owned by Morgan Stanley and [...]
Etisalat chases stake in Zain December 19, 2010 Middle Eastern telecoms company Etisalat said yesterday it still wants to buy a 46 per cent stake in Kuwaiti rival Zain, in response to market rumours that the seller, a consortium led by Kharafi Group, was struggling to recruit enough shareholder support. The firm will this week hear the results of a Kuwaiti court hearing [...]
The UK’s largest housebuilder says the road to recovery will be long December 19, 2010 PERSIMMON chief executive Mike Farley is not looking for a magic bullet. The boss of the country’s largest housebuilder is clear that the sector has endured its worst slump since World War Two and faces at least a two-year road to recovery. The industry tends to listen when Farley speaks. Not just because he runs [...]
SMELLING OF ROSES IN CAMERON’S NEW COURT December 19, 2010 AND so it came to pass. Outgoing Marks & Spencer chief Stuart Rose has wasted little time in finding another gig for himself: he’s been offered a job working on David Cameron’s “happiness index”, a headline-grabbing little initiative being led by the Office for National Statistics to monitor our “national wellbeing” as a supplement to [...]
BILL OF THE WEEK December 19, 2010 AN unruly handful of advertising sales executives made a merry time of their recent Christmas party in Chamberlain’s restaurant in Leadenhall Market. The drinks bill was stopped at a generous £2,000 for the group (though they kept on undeterred), but our revellers were well-lubricated before they even began on the downstairs bar, having glugged their way [...]
Christmas cheer to lift the markets December 19, 2010 TRADING is expected to be range-bound on European stock markets on the open today, with a mild bias to the upside as we begin a holiday-shortened week. GFT is quoting the FTSE 100 index to open up six points from Friday’s close, at a level of 5,877. The German DAX 40 is expected to open [...]
