Axe falls on 133 shops as JJB gives up October 1, 2012 AROUND 2,200 staff at JJB Sports were made redundant yesterday after administrator KPMG finally closed down 133 of the stricken retailer’s stores and sold the remaining 20 shops to Sports Direct. The rival group, controlled by Newcastle United football club owner Mike Ashley, has bought the JJB brand, its stock, as well as the Slazenger [...]
Osborne hit by drops in credit and factory stats October 1, 2012 HOPES for a growing recovery in the UK economy were dented yesterday by two data releases that exposed weak lending rates and another contraction in the country’s manufacturing sector. Consumer credit and mortgage lending both unexpectedly sank in August, according to figures from the Bank of England, dipping by £134m and £276m respectively. Total lending [...]
Greece cuts again as sixth year of recession looms October 1, 2012 THE GREEK government announced more austerity measures yesterday as it battled to convince international creditors that it deserves the next tranche of its bailout cash. Its new draft budget predicts the economy will shrink by 3.8 per cent in 2013, its sixth consecutive year of recession. That represents a stark turnaround from EU estimates back [...]
A strange kind of green shoots: Welcome to the New Normal October 1, 2012 GREEN shoots in the economy are a bit like beauty: they are in the eye of the beholder. Such is the confused, contradictory state of the British economy that one can just as easily be bullish or bearish, depending on which facts one chooses to pick out. For every piece of good news, one can [...]
FSA charges four men with insider dealing October 1, 2012 FOUR financiers were charged with insider dealing yesterday by the Financial Services Authority (FSA). The men are accused of making £3m in profits from illegal dealing from November 2006 to March 2010. Martyn Dodgson is the only one who was FSA registered. He was a senior corporate broker at Deutsche Bank during some of the [...]
What the other papers say this morning October 1, 2012 FINANCIAL TIMES Call to pay bank bonuses in debt Banks should pay bonuses in debt, which would be wiped out if a bank failed, an EU banking report will suggest as Europe attempts to step up the fight against bankers’ pay. The Liikanen commission, an independent review set up almost a year ago by EU [...]
Miliband to focus on apprentices October 1, 2012 Labour leader Ed Miliband will today use his conference speech in Manchester to call on businesses to offer more apprenticeships and vocational training for the “forgotten 50 per cent” of youngsters who do not go to university. He is expected to demand that firms with government contracts provide apprenticeships, as well as touching on the [...]
Google surpasses Microsoft October 1, 2012 Trading yesterday pushed Google’s market capitalisation above Microsoft’s for the first time ever, making the search giant the world’s second largest technology company. Google rose one per cent to close at $761.78, implying a valuation of $249.9bn (£154.9bn) – while Microsoft shares slipped slightly to $29.49, pricing it at $247.2bn. Analysts put the development down [...]
US interest rates will stay low October 1, 2012 Federal Reserve governor Ben Bernanke yesterday reiterated the US central bank’s commitment to low interest rates going well into the future, “as long as price stability is preserved.” Previously markets have been boosted by similar promises, but this time the market response was muted. “[The] market [is] not popping like it used to on dovish [...]
Shareholder vents anger as Xstrata backs £56bn deal October 1, 2012 XSTRATA shareholder Thread-needle, one of the 25 largest stakeholders in the miner, yesterday slammed the recommended £56bn mega-merger with commodities trader Glencore. Xstrata yesterday backed the tie-up with Glencore, although with conditions. In a letter sent to shareholders Iain Richards, head of corporate governance at Threadneedle, which holds 0.29 per cent of Xstrata, said he [...]
