ING to close its emerging markets equities business October 1, 2012 THERE was further sign of retrenchment in the City’s financial services sector yesterday as ING Bank, which employs around 900 people in London, announced that it is closing its emerging markets equities business. ING, which acquired much of its expertise in eastern Europe when it bought Barings in 1995, is closing all its central eastern [...]
Balls criticised over plan to use 4G proceeds to build homes October 1, 2012 THE INSTITUTE of Directors (IoD) yesterday criticised shadow chancellor Ed Balls after he proposed using £4bn from the sale of 4G mobile phone licences to subsidise affordable homes. “The windfall from the 4G auction is a rare bit of good news for the public finances, and any money it raises must be used wisely,” said [...]
AA owner appoints bankers October 1, 2012 Acromas, the private equity backed owner of AA and Saga, has hired UBS and Lazard to help it draw up plans to sell, float or refinance the businesses. It follows the appointment of Ernst & Young at the end of last month to undertake due diligence to value its assets, as it mulls its options [...]
HSBC sells property advice unit October 1, 2012 Managers at HSBC’s property advisory unit Property Vision Holdings are set to buy the subsidiary from the bank, it was announced yesterday. PV Acquisition is expected to complete the takeover later this quarter. The unit has gross assets of $7.2m (£4.46m) at the end of June. HSBC did not disclose the purchase price, but did [...]
Workday IPO sets value at $3.85bn October 1, 2012 Workday, which provides cloud-based human resource software, said it plans to price its initial public offering of Class A shares at between $21 and $24 each, valuing the Silicon Valley company at $3.85bn (£2.4bn). Workday was co-founded by ex-PeopleSoft executives David Duffield and Aneel Bhusri, who left PeopleSoft in 2004. It confidentially filed for an [...]
Eurozone reels as jobless count surges to 18.2m October 1, 2012 DEVASTATING unemployment data cast a shadow over the Eurozone yesterday, while separate manufacturing figures also pointed towards the region’s economic decline. The number of unemployed people in the single currency area hit 18.19m in August, an increase of 2.14m compared to 12 months earlier. And factories throughout the euro area recorded their 14th straight month [...]
Moody’s says Spain’s bailout may not rescue all its banks October 1, 2012 THE SPANISH bank bailout will not be sufficient to fully recapitalise the broken institutions, credit ratings agency Moody’s warned yesterday. And the Basel Committee warned the EU that it has fallen behind on two key areas in the implementation of tough new stability rules, which could give European banks an unfair advantage over global rivals. [...]
Banco Popular in €2.5bn funding bid October 1, 2012 SPANISH lender Banco Popular is planning to issue shares in a bid to avoid taking public funding, the bank announced yesterday. Stress tests published last week revealed a €3.2bn (£2.6bn) shortfall in the bank’s capital levels, meaning it will have to tap the government’s bailout fund – backed by the Eurozone – if it does [...]
Agricole at last gets rid of Greek arm October 1, 2012 CREDIT Agricole yesterday said it will pay Alpha Bank over half a billion euros to take Greek subsidiary Emporiki off its hands, on top of billions it has already injected into the lender. The bank’s shares rose 7.4 per cent on the news. France’s third-largest bank said it was negotiating to sell Emporiki for a [...]
Europe lags as IATA ups airline profits outlook October 1, 2012 THE world’s airlines have raised their profit forecasts for 2012 and expect improved performance in 2013, the International Air Transport Association (IATA) said yesterday. But Europe, mired in an ongoing debt crisis, is expected to suffer wider-than-expected losses of $1.2bn, IATA added. Many firms will be helped by efforts by North American airlines to trim [...]
