Koreans snap up French shopping mall August 17, 2010 SOUTH Korea’s National Pension Service (NPS) said yesterday it would buy a 51 per cent stake in a French shopping mall from Anglo-French property investor Hammerson for around 350bn won (£189m). The deal is the latest addition to NPS’s growing investments in overseas property assets which include a $767m (£493m) purchase of Sony Center in [...]
SMITH JETS OFF ON LAST MINUTE HOLIDAY August 17, 2010 IN THE wake of the crisis, understated chic is still the name of the game for City top dogs – even when they’re kicking back on their summer hols. Who should be spotted by one of The Capitalist’s spies yesterday in Juan Les Pins, France, but Tullett Prebon boss Terry Smith, still pale-faced on the [...]
BEST OF THE BROKERS August 17, 2010 LLOYDS Morgan Stanley places an “underweight” rating on Lloyds banking group. It says first-half figures were reassuring but warns of lower improvement ahead, with a slowing down of its book re-pricing. The bank faces a funding challenge, with the world facing austerity measures and a predicted housing dip by the end of 2011, it believes. [...]
Carillion renews EDF contract August 17, 2010 Support services company Carillion has been awarded a five-year extension to its existing contracts with EDF Energy, worth £200m. Carillion’s existing four-year contracts began in 2007, and are being extended from January 2011. Under the contract extensions, worth £40m a year, Carillion will deliver infrastructure services for sub-stations and cabling to support the electricity network [...]
Thomas Cook in meter deal August 17, 2010 Bglobal, the smart metering and energy data firm, has signed a contract with travel firm Thomas Cook. It will install 800 electricity smart meters and provide associated data services across Thomas Cook UK’s stores. Bglobal’s other retail clients include JD Sports Fashion, Schuh and Superdrug.
Senior buys US rival for $13.3m August 17, 2010 Manufacturing firm Senior said yesterday it had bought US rival WahlcoMetroflex (WMX) for $13.3m (£8.5m). WMX manufactures exhaust gas systems and other parts for the energy industry. WMX reported sales of $9.7m and profit before interest and tax of $1.1m in the first half of the year. The acquisition is expected to be immediately earnings [...]
EnQuest boosts earnings August 17, 2010 North Sea oil explorer EnQuest reported a sharp rise in half-year profits and upped its production quota for the year yesterday after its drilling programme beat expectations. Just four months after the firm was formed from the demerged UK unit of Petrofac and Lundin, it saw pre-tax profits soar to $86.2m (£55.3m) from $2.9m a [...]
CITY MOVES | WHO’S SWITCHING JOBS August 17, 2010 World Gold Council The WGC has appointed David Badham as head of investment marketing for Europe, effective immediately. Badham joins from the Royal Bank of Scotland, where he was head of communications and marketing for the global markets division in the EMEA region. Prior to the acquisition of NatWest by RBS in 2000, he was [...]
Cameron takes stock after 100 days in power August 17, 2010 TONY Blair, who releases his memoirs next month, says his biggest regret was not doing enough during his early years in power. He wasted his first 100 days – and indeed much of his first term – basking in the glory of Labour’s landslide win. By the time he turned his attention to public service [...]
HOW DO YOU RATE THE COALITION’S FIRST 100 DAYS IN POWER? August 17, 2010 DR PATRICK NOLAN | REFORM Its goal of a smaller government and stronger society is right but many of its policies go in exactly the other direction. Governments need to take the tough decisions straight away when their political capital is at its highest. That means looking again at the big spending areas of health [...]
