Blow for Tory party as poll lead crumbles February 28, 2010 GORDON Brown is on course to win the general election, according to an opinion poll. The Conservative lead over Labour has narrowed to just two points, a YouGov poll for the Sunday Times found yesterday. David Cameron’s Tory party is now on 37 per cent, according to YouGov, with Labour on 25 per cent and [...]
Election2010 February 28, 2010 Brown bully claims resurface The “bullygate” row that is plaguing Gordon Brown is refusing to die down. Yesterday, The Mail on Sunday released a tape recording of a Brown aide admitting that the Prime Minister pushed him. Dr Stewart Wood, the Prime Minister’s senior foreign policy adviser, told an undercover reporter that he was left “‘shocked [...]
Warren Buffett’s next task: train a successor February 28, 2010 WHEN the times get tough, everyone turns to old favourites. This is especially true of investors, hence the renewed interest in two of the greatest names in finance. Anthony Bolton, Britain’s stock-picker extraordinaire, has come out of retirement to launch a new Fidelity China fund; and on Saturday Warren Buffett’s shareholder letter enthused his army [...]
WHAT THE OTHER PAPERS SAY THIS MORNING February 28, 2010 THE SUNDAYS The Sunday Telegraph NIKE BOSS MARK PARKER DEMANDS NEW RULES ON VALUING BUSINESS The global chief executive of Nike, one of the most powerful retail brands in the world, has said that companies will have to find more sophisticated ways of judging value and impact on the environment if they are to resist [...]
Berkshire’s earnings jump February 28, 2010 WARREN Buffett has said the hundreds of billions of dollars of taxpayer-funded bailouts of corporate America will eventually pay off. But he thinks they shouldn’t pay off for the wealthy people whose carelessness or ignorance made them necessary. In his annual letter to shareholders of his Berkshire Hathaway, Buffett offered acerbic criticism of financial industry [...]
Eurozone set for a £27bn Greek bailout February 28, 2010 EUROZONE leaders are believed to be dangling a €30bn (£27bn) bailout package in front of Greece in exchange for a harsher set of austerity measures from Athens. Amid growing fears over a possible sovereign default, Germany and France are understood to be finalising a plan that will see state-owned banks buy Greek gilts. German government-owned [...]
Merrill overtakes UBS in league of the big FTSE 100 brokerships February 28, 2010 DESPITE the fallout from its at times heated takeover by Bank of America, Merrill Lynch has climbed up to second place in the table of biggest advisors to FTSE 100 companies, according to a report due out shortly from Hemscott. Merrill’s elevation comes at the expense of its Swiss rival, UBS, with whom it last [...]
Merck in $7.2bn Millipore buyout February 28, 2010 German pharmaceutical company Merck has entered into an agreement to buy up tech firm Millipore. It will acquire all of Millipore’s shares for $107 ($70) per share cash, valuing the deal at around $7.2bn including net debt. Merck said it is confident the deal will go ahead later this year. The news follows a statement [...]
M&S boss in new pressure to cut salary February 28, 2010 MARKS & Spencer’s (M&S’s) joint chief executive and chairman Sir Stuart Rose has seen renewed investor demands to reduce his pay in the latest shareholder salvo against executive pay deals. Rose, who assumed the joint title of chairman and chief executive last year, could see his £1.13m salary reduced by investors after an ongoing and [...]
Shell to offload its European interests February 28, 2010 Shell will offload more of its European liquid petroleum gas (LPG) operations in a bid to raise $3bn (£2bn). The firm will use the money to help fund a $28bn capital spending programme. Shell’s French LPG business, which specialises in bottled gas, is expected to raise in the region of €1bn (£900,000). It is also [...]
