Will fortune favour brave Bob Diamond’s Panmure Gordon takeover, Unilever’s flawed logic and the IoD’s Simon Walker heads back to his PR roots March 17, 2017 He's back – and brave. Conventional wisdom has it that smaller City brokers are destined either to merge or die, so a Bob Diamond-backed move for Panmure Gordon represents a bold bet that he and his partners can forge a fresh path for one of the broking world’s most venerable names. Boldness isn’t a fitting adjective [...]
A pensions Green deal that needs energy to understand March 3, 2017 The Green deal: a government-sponsored scheme eventually discarded after failing to adequately explain its benefits and providing poor value to participants. I’m referring, of course, to a Tory-Lib Dem coalition energy-efficiency programme, but is it a description which applies equally well to Sir Philip Green’s £363m settlement with regulators over the pension crisis at BHS? On [...]
Davos Diary: Prime Minister May’s reception as cold as the weather January 20, 2017 At the very least, this week’s Davos agenda had a weary air of familiarity about it: sustainability, artificial intelligence and income inequality all competing to be hailed the zeitgeistian focus of the world’s power-brokers’ power breakfasts. In that respect, little has changed. But if the Trump presidential machine rolls into town this time next year, I [...]
A big year, but it won’t Trump 2016’s shocks January 6, 2017 2016's events made fools of most pundits, and looking back at my column exactly a year ago, I fared little better. True, I correctly said that Santander UK would re-engage in an effort to buy Royal Bank of Scotland's Williams & Glyn unit, but I was well wide of the mark arguing that the FTSE-100 [...]
Tata leadership race must show open mind December 16, 2016 Trump, May, Modi: protectionism takes many forms, and has many masters (and mistresses). In India, a curious case of economic nationalism is quietly unfolding at the country’s most significant conglomerate. In one sense, that’s unsurprising – India’s track record of foreign ownership restrictions in industries like insurance, banking and technology, is a lengthy one. But at [...]
Oil boss needs buyers to Shell out for assets November 4, 2016 A brave face. That's the best way to describe this week's trading updates from Britain's two oil behemoths. It’s now a familiar visage for BP's Bob Dudley and Shell's Ben van Beurden. Oil prices continue to hover stubbornly below $50-a-barrel, raising justifiable concerns about the companies’ ability to cover their dividends without substantial further cuts [...]
Gender is secondary at Walmsley’s GSK September 23, 2016 If the patient isn't responding, change the medicine: that's been the crude, but long-running, summary of some investors' prescription for Britain's biggest pharmaceuticals group. So for GlaxoSmithKline (GSK) investors, the least important aspect of Emma Walmsley's appointment as its next chief executive is her gender. That doesn't make it unimportant, of course: as the global [...]
Pressure for pay reform may now be irresistible September 9, 2016 Chris Philp’s timing is impeccable. Theresa May’s fresh vow to reform executive pay had no sooner been uttered this week than her fellow Conservative MP was spraying bullets at company directors, institutional investors and remuneration consultants. A looming autumn crackdown by the government explains why committee room 15 in the House of Commons was packed on [...]
It’s time to purge the stock market’s noticeboard of PR puff and let activist investors report on what really matters August 12, 2016 It's not exactly needle-in-a-haystack stuff: trawl through the reams of regulatory news announcements on most days and you will spot numerous examples of public relations puff masquerading as crucial investor information. So it’s disappointing that this week has thrown into sharp focus yet another of the perversities of London’s listings regime – and one which [...]
Andrew Tyrie’s claim about banks’ back-door lobbying is holed December 4, 2014 There are few things bankers dread more than being summoned for hours of intellectual flagellation by Andrew Tyrie, the relentless chairman of the Treasury Select Committee. He has scored several notable victories, including a blueprint for regulators to hold reserve powers to break up major UK banks. On his latest target – [...]
