Consumers hoard 38m credit cards July 22, 2009 Consumers are holding on to 38m unused credit cards, with a total credit limit of £200bn, in a desperate bid to cling to a financial safety net, according to a report published yesterday by uSwitch.com. With unemployment at 2.38m and over 3m credit card rejections over the past 12 months, consumers are increasingly “loathe to [...]
Nomura faces shock claims at tribunal July 22, 2009 NOMURA is accused of making a star salesman redundant because he blew the whistle on client abuses at the Lehman Brothers Europe division it bought last year, an employment tribunal heard yesterday. In accusations denied by Nomura, former sales star Paul Ryb said his redundancy from the Japanese bank in March 2009 was motivated by [...]
Nasdaq up despite bad day for banks July 22, 2009 THE Nasdaq rose yesterday for the 11th straight day, buoyed by solid profits from Apple and Starbucks, while disappointing bank results and declining energy shares weighed on the broader market. The Dow Jones industrial average declined, halting a seven-day winning streak, as investors sold some of the market’s recent winners to take profits, and the [...]
Pharmaceuticals inject more life into the FTSE 100’s rise July 22, 2009 THE FTSE 100 added 0.3 per cent yesterday, extending its winning streak to eight sessions thanks to modest gains on Wall Street and solid second-quarter results from drugs giant GlaxoSmithKline. At the close, the index was 12.56 points higher at 4,493.73, up 8.2 per cent over the past eight sessions. Drug maker Shire was the [...]
MYNERS: BANK BOFFINS CAN’T REPLACE THE FSA July 22, 2009 CITY minister Lord Myners yesterday launched a scathing attack on Tory plans to transfer huge regulatory powers to the Bank of England, claiming the central bank neither wants nor has the right skills for the job. “They have misjudged the competence and culture of the Bank of England. The Bank is a very academic institution. [...]
EasyHotel boosted by London July 22, 2009 Budget hotelier easyHotel, founded by entrepreneur Stelios Haji-Ioannou, yesterday posted buoyant trading in its London premises as it progresses with plans to expand overseas. The company said like-for-like occupancy at its hotels in the capital rose to 94 per cent in the second quarter compared with 90 per cent occupancy in the same three months [...]
No up-turn until mid-2010 July 22, 2009 Battle-damaged by a year of recession and plagued by poor liquidity, the UK’s largest firms will be unable to respond to the economic upturn when it emerges, according to research by Roland Berger Strategy Consultants. It found companies do not anticipate recovery until next year, but hit by poor turnover, an ongoing credit shortage, late-paying [...]
World trade set to shrink 10 per cent during 2009 July 22, 2009 ASIA is leading a recovery in global trade, but world trade volumes are still expected to shrink 10 per cent this year, the World Trade Organisation (WTO) said yesterday. The WTO’s forecast for 2009 world trade, which confirmed recent comments by its director general Pascal Lamy, is a revision from a previous forecast of a [...]
Weaker UK orders for factories in July July 22, 2009 BRITISH manufacturing orders have fallen at their fastest rate since January 1992 this month, a survey showed yesterday, disappointing hopes for a speedy recovery in the sector. The Confederation of British Industry’s (CBI) industrial trends survey showed the order book balance fell to -59 in July from -51 in June, below analysts’ expectations of a [...]
MPC stands united on QE July 22, 2009 IT WAS a unanimous vote from the Bank of England’s Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) to hold interest rates and keep quantitative easing (QE) at the current level of £125bn, minutes from the July meeting showed yesterday. The minutes of the 8-9 July meeting indicated that while the extension of QE was the central question for [...]
