Record yen intervention in Japan August 31, 2011 Japanese authorities splashed a fresh daily record high of 4.513 trillion yen (£36.2bn) on currency intervention last month, official data revealed yesterday. The measures were overseen by then-minister of finance Yoshihiko Noda, who has since been named as the country’s new Prime Minister. The Bank of Japan is believed to have intervened in the currency [...]
Triple IPO for Mongolian miner August 31, 2011 Mongolia’s government plans to list state-owned Erdenes-Tavan Tolgoi, which controls one of the world’s largest untapped coking coal deposits, in Hong Kong, London and Ulan Bator. The initial public offering in the three cities would take place if the government could “overcome technical and logistical hurdles”, it said. The Tavan Tolgoi deposit, in Mongolia’s south [...]
Merkel gets bailout relief August 31, 2011 GERMAN Chancellor Angela Merkel won vital backing from her cabinet for changes to the Eurozone’s main bailout fund yesterday, prompting a short relief rally in the euro. The proposed changes to the European Financial Stability Facility (EFSF) must now go to Germany’s lower house for ratification on 29 September, where Merkel is expected to face [...]
Darling: I almost got rid of exasperating Mervyn King August 31, 2011 FORMER chancellor Alistair Darling has revealed that he and Gordon Brown almost fired Bank of England governor Mervyn King in 2008. In extracts of his forthcoming memoir that have appeared online, Darling calls King “amazingly stubborn and exasperating” and suggests that his term as governor would not have been renewed for a second time had [...]
Spiked US IPOs hit decade high August 31, 2011 EQUITY market turmoil caused 15 US corporate IPOs to be withdrawn in August, the highest number since April 2001, data from Dealogic showed yesterday. August saw the number of completed floats reach the lowest volume since 2009 as fears over US and European sovereign debts caused a mass sell-off in equities. Just four IPOs got [...]
Galleon trader gets five years August 31, 2011 A FORMER trader at the Galleon Group hedge fund was sentenced yesterday to five-and-a-half years in prison, a term the judge said should serve as a warning to Wall Street that insider trading was a serious crime. Craig Drimal, 55, who pleaded guilty in April, was arrested as part of a sweeping government crackdown on [...]
BNY MELLON CHIEF STEPS DOWN August 31, 2011 BANK of New York Mellon Corp said Robert Kelly (pictured) has stepped down as chairman and chief executive officer after three years, following differences in approach to managing the company. The company named board member Gerald Hassell as chairman and CEO, effective immediately, sending its shares down more than one per cent in late trading.
MPs call for bank reforms to be delayed August 31, 2011 A GROWING number of Tory backbenchers are calling for sweeping banking reforms to be delayed over fears they could damage the fragile economic recovery. Their intervention came as Vince Cable (pictured), the business secretary, attacked UK banks for being “disingenuous in the extreme” after they argued the Vickers reforms could force them to scale back [...]
WHAT DO THE BANKS SAY ABOUT THE RINGFENCE? August 31, 2011 LLOYDS Lloyds has taken the most pro-ringfence stance of all the banks – and argues that almost all of Lloyds’ operations should be inside the fence. Chief executive António Horta-Osório (pictured) argues that a ringfence should form a crucial part of a resolution plan to allow regulators to wind up failing banks in an orderly way. [...]
CITY VIEWS: IS NOW THE RIGHT TIME TO BRING IN BANKING REFORMS? August 31, 2011 CHRIS BATCHELOR | LLOYDS “It’s not the right time as it will increase the cost of retail banking. The inability to get mortgages will destabilise the housing market, shaking the economy.” JAMES GIBSON | CRONE CORKILL/WILLIS “No, I think that we should hang on six months to see what happens; recently the FTSE has been [...]
