Thiam to say sorry at AGM June 6, 2010 PRUDENTIAL chief executive Tidjane Thiam will apologise to shareholders today for wasting more than £450m in the course of the insurer’s disastrous AIA bid. He and other senior Prudential figures will come face-to-face with shareholders for the first time since the embarrassing collapse of the $35.5bn (£25bn) bid. In what promises to be a fractious [...]
Chloride set for higher bid June 6, 2010 EMERSON ELECTRIC, the American manufacturing and technology giant, will this week step up its pursuit of guaranteed power supplier Chloride by increasing its £723m takeover bid. David Farr, Emerson’s chairman, is said to have spent last week ringing round investors to work out what he would need to pay to get their support for a [...]
Chinese wind power firm set for £810m Hong Kong float June 6, 2010 CHINESE wind power equipment supplier Xinjiang Goldwind Science & Technology said yesterday it planned to raise up to HK$9.1bn (£810m) in a Hong Kong initial public offering. Goldwind, which is already listed on the Shenzhen stock exchange, said it was selling 395m shares with an indicative price range between HK$19.8 and HK$23 per share, confirming [...]
Message to Emerson: it is time to start bidding ‘em up June 6, 2010 EMERSON’S investment bankers should take a leaf out of the late Bruce Wasserstein’s playbook. Bid ‘em up Brucie, as the Wall Street legend was known, would tell his clients they needed to up their bid to bring home the bacon. With its current offer of 275p laughably low, Emerson would do well to heed such [...]
Sick days cost UK plc £16.8bn June 6, 2010 PUBLIC sector workers took 43 per cent more sick days than their private sector colleagues last year, according to research out today. Workers in the public sector take an average of 8.3 days off sick per year, compared with 5.8 days per private sector employee, a survey by the Confederation of British Industry (CBI) and [...]
Bidders circle Reliance stock June 6, 2010 INDIA’s Reliance Communications, burdened by debt and the cost of rolling out 3G services, said its board had agreed to sell up to 26 per cent of the firm, which could be worth nearly $2bn at current market levels. Reliance Comm, India’s second-biggest mobile carrier, did not disclose any timeframe for a possible deal in [...]
I confess: I was far too optimistic about debt June 6, 2010 I am feeling a little gloomy. I started this sovereign debt crisis looking on the bright side but now I have been got at. So many of our guests at CNBC are downbeat right now that the downdraft has been hard to dodge. Markets took time out from worrying about government debt at the end [...]
UBS set to settle tax dispute with US government thanks to Swiss treaty June 6, 2010 SWITZERLAND’S largest bank UBS could end a long-running tax dispute with America tomorrow, when the Swiss parliament is expected to approve a treaty to hand over files on thousands of suspected tax cheats to US authorities. The deal to relax Swiss laws on banking secrecy could still be halted by rogue votes from opposition parties, [...]
Chairman Phil Wrigley to give Habitat a new look June 6, 2010 PHIL Wrigley, the former boss of New Look, has been appointed executive chairman of loss-making furniture chain Habitat. Habitat, founded by Sir Terence Conran, was sold by the Kamprad family, heirs to the Ikea fortune, to Hilco last December. Last year Habitat reported losses of €42m (£35m) as buyers shied away from it high-end products [...]
Shrek makers laughing hard June 6, 2010 The studio behind “Shrek Forever After” had plenty to laugh about as the film beat a pair of comedies at the North American box office to take the top spot for the third straight weekend. The animated film’s strong staying power and its estimated weekend take of $25.3m (£17..5m) bodes well for DreamWorks Animation, which [...]
