Pearson unveils restructuring plan as it forecasts flat earnings February 25, 2013 EDUCATION group Pearson said this morning it expects its 2013 earnings to be broadly flat on the prior year, as it launched a £150m restructuring plan. Sales rose five per cent at constant exchange rates to £6.1bn over the full year, with digital and services businesses contributing 50 per cent of revenues. Adjusted earnings per [...]
Bunzl hikes dividend as revenues rise February 25, 2013 OUTSOURCER Bunzl this morning hiked its dividend seven per cent, as revenue jumped six per cent over the year to December. Group revenue increased to £5.4bn over 2012 – up from £5.1bn in 2011 – driven by recent acquisitions. At the start of this year Bunzl snapped up four businesses for around £140m, including Chilean [...]
Sterling slides to 16-month low February 25, 2013 Following Moody's action on Friday, downgrading the UK's AAA-rating, sterling has fallen to a 16-month low against the dollar this morning. (Source: Yahoo!Finance) From the Editor's column: The real problem, as HSBC’s currency team, led by David Bloom, noted last night, is that markets “expected [Osborne’s] plan to succeed and sterling [...]
Time for plan AA February 25, 2013 BRITAIN urgently needs to slash red tape, cut taxes and improve transport links to get growth back on track, City grandees argued last night, urging George Osborne to reform the economy without wasting any more time. The government lost its triple-A credit rating from Moody’s on Friday night as borrowing is on course to rise [...]
Pension changes will make it much more expensive for firms to hire staff February 25, 2013 WORKPLACE pension reforms will slash the UK’s competitiveness and pile on the cost of employing workers for cash-strapped companies, figures out today show. Auto-enrolment is set to make pension saving for UK workers mandatory but laws forcing employers to stump up cash as well is set to threaten the UK’s low employment cost advantage, chartered [...]
Clegg knew of Lib Dem sex claims for years February 25, 2013 NICK Clegg was last night forced to admit he was aware of sexual harassment claims made against a senior Liberal Democrat official four years ago, as the growing scandal engulfed his party. The Deputy Prime Minister cut short his holiday to deal with the crisis after several women alleged they had been molested by Lord [...]
Pound’s value slashed by two thirds over 30 years February 25, 2013 THE POUND has lost two thirds of its value since 1982, a study revealed this morning. Steady inflation over the past thirty years has seen the average price of a pint more than treble, from £0.73 to £3.18, gold more than quadruple in price, and the average house price go up five times, the analysis [...]
Loss of UK’s AAA-rating will intensify the pressure on sterling February 25, 2013 GIVEN George Osborne’s failure to cut spending enough, his wrong-headed decision to rely primarily on tax hikes during the first years of his austerity plan and his inability to push through growth-enhancing reforms, the UK’s loss of its AAA rating had long become inevitable. The rating agencies have made lots of silly calls in the [...]
Faith in politics at risk from bad data, MPs warn February 25, 2013 GOVERNMENT departments are fiddling figures and ignoring official guidelines on the proper use of data, undermining public confidence in important numbers, an influential committee of MPs has ruled in a report out today. The public administration select committee praised the statistics code itself, arguing that reliable figures are vital to good policy and to public [...]
Cyprus’s new leader pledges a bailout deal February 25, 2013 THE NEW leader of Cyprus, conservative Nicos Anastasiades, yesterday promised to finalise a bailout package for the Eurozone island after winning the presidential run-off election. Anastasiades moved quickly to distance himself from the outgoing Communist government, pledging to “restore the credibility of Cyprus in Europe and internationally”. The decisive outcome showed a clear mandate from [...]
