…though office take-up slows August 10, 2010 LONDON-BASED companies took up just 1.3m square feet of new office space in the last three months, half the activity level seen at the start of the year. Yet the research from King Sturge also offers hope for office landlords, predicting a rise in office-based financial services jobs in the coming months that will boost [...]
Saudis grant RIM reprieve on BlackBerry August 10, 2010 BlackBerry maker Research In Motion (RIM) yesterday won a reprieve from a threatened ban in Saudi Arabia as authorities said progress was being made on addressing their concerns. The company’s biggest Gulf market with 700,000 users, Saudi Arabia had threatened to ban the service last Friday before giving RIM until Monday as it worked with [...]
Google raided by South Korea over privacy August 10, 2010 SOUTH Korean police said they raided Google’s Seoul office yesterday on suspicion that the internet giant had illegally collected data on users. Google has been preparing since late last year to launch its Street View service in the country and the data collection was related to the launch, police said. The probe in one of [...]
CITY MOVES | WHO’S SWITCHING JOBS August 10, 2010 RBC RBC has appointed Guido Giammattei to its global asset management division as a portfolio manager on the RBC Emerging Markets Fund, focusing on the Latin American region. Giammattei was previously at Rexiter Capital Management, where he was an equity analyst and then a portfolio manager focused on Latin American investments. He has also previously [...]
Saras swings back to profit August 10, 2010 Italy’s third-biggest oil refiner Saras, squeezed by weak refining margins, yesterday said it was cutting production by more than 10 per cent to shore up profit. Saras is also more than halving capital spending this year to help keep debt under control, said chief financial officer Corrado Costanzo. The oil price rally to $80 (£50.8) [...]
ICBC eyes £889m spend to take Hong Kong unit private August 10, 2010 Industrial and Commercial Bank of China (ICBC), the world’s most valuable bank, yesterday said it will pay shareholders of its Hong Kong arm a 27 per cent premium to take it private, as part of an effort to expand its presence there. Each ICBC (Asia) shareholder would receive HK$29.45 (£2.4) per share, ICBC said in [...]
BEST OF THE BROKERS August 10, 2010 SMITH & NEPHEW Evo Securities rates Smith & Nephew shares a “buy” with a price target of 695p. In a note in which its analysts speculate over what the company plans to do with the cash it is generating, Evo sees strong earnings growth and inventory efficiency as key factors driving future cash generation. ATH [...]
NAB happy to maintain status quo in the UK August 10, 2010 National Australia Bank (NAB) yesterday said it was happy with the status quo in the UK and any acquisitions it made there would have to meet its financial criteria. NAB chief executive Cameron Clyne also told analysts there were no immediate plans to change the mortgage rate despite rising funding costs. NAB’s UK operations – [...]
Hannover Re hit by pricing pressure fear August 10, 2010 Hannover Re yesterday joined a wave of European insurance players reporting forecast-beating results as rising premiums amid economic recovery offset high damage claims. However, analysts expressed worry about Hannover’s underwriting performance in the second quarter and the prospect of reinsurance prices coming under pressure, contributing to a fall in Hannover’s shares which closed six per [...]
RBS poaches Tapner of UBS to head wealth management August 10, 2010 Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) has hired Rory Tapner to head its wealth management arm just as flagship private banking arm Coutts faces a regulatory probe into sales of a savings product. Tapner joins from Swiss bank UBS where he was chairman and chief executive of the Asia-Pacific businesses. He is also a former global [...]
