WESTFIELD CUTS CHARGES June 2, 2009 WESTFIELD shopping centre yesterday bowed to pressure from retailers by dropping its service charges at its White City mall from £13.94 a sq ft to £12.98. Retailers were angered in September after the group hiked its fees sharply from the £8.50 initially agreed. Westfield said the reductions were part of a six month trading review [...]
Penna profits boosted by turmoil in the job market June 2, 2009 HUMAN resources consultancy Penna Consulting yesterday reported a trebling in full year profits as it continues to capitalise on increased demand from firms juggling their recruitment strategies in the downturn. Pre-tax profit soared 176 per cent to £6m for the year to March, while revenue grew 30 per cent to £63.2m. Penna said it saw [...]
Wednesday looks for 20m June 2, 2009 SHEFFIELD Wednesday’s chairman Lee Strafford has just appointed US banking advisers to help him flush out a £20m investment for the Championship football club. Strafford, who co-founded PlusNet before selling it to BT in 2007 for £67m, has just returned from the US where he and Wednesday chief executive Nick Parker met a number of [...]
Intermediate Capital sinks to first loss June 2, 2009 INTERMEDIATE Capital Group (ICG), which lends money to buyout firms, has fallen to the first loss in its history as bad debts mounted amid the financial crisis. The specialist financier suffered a pre-tax loss of £67m in the year ending 31 March, a dramatic reversal from the £230m profit it booked in the previous year. [...]
INFLATION NO THREAT TO THE DOLLAR June 2, 2009 BORIS SCHLOSSBERGDIRECTOR OF CURRENCY RESEARCH, GFT OVER the past two weeks, the US dollar has been battered from all sides, hitting yearly lows against the euro, pound and all Commonwealth currencies. Economic data has shown steady improvement, giving investors more confidence to move their capital into higher-yielding, riskier currencies. But the growing fear that US [...]
SEC creates new senior position in bid to improve its reputation June 2, 2009 THE US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) is to create a position of chief operating officer to help manage the regulator and improve internal operations, its chairman Mary Schapiro said yesterday. Schapiro said she was in the process of reviewing the SEC’s operations, including how it manages its records and call centres, to ensure it [...]
Premium food brands are staging a comeback June 2, 2009 AFTER the extensive coverage that the ascent of the discounter retailers received throughout 2008, it may come as a surprise to hear that the trend has been reversing for the past six months. From the beginning of January 2008 through to mid-November, the value-brand supermarkets of Aldi, Lidl, Netto and Somerfield achieved an average uplift [...]
Omega in Names offer June 2, 2009 OMEGA Insurance plans to boost its exposure to Lloyds of London, spending up to £125m buying out Names who are members of the insurance market’s successful Syndicate 958. Omega already has a 16 per cent stake in Syndicate 958, which has turned a profit every year since 1980. It is offering to pay private investors [...]
Technicals will help you profit from bullish cable outlook June 2, 2009 IN January sterling was the whipping boy of the currency markets, culminating in near-parity with the euro and investors like Jim Rogers proposed dollar parity in 2009. But what a difference six months can make. Yesterday sterling hit another seven-month high against the dollar – up 20 per cent on the pair’s January lows. But [...]
Acer to launch a Google laptop June 2, 2009 Acer, the world’s third-biggest PC brand, said yesterday it plans to sell netbook PCs that run on Google’s Android operating software in the third quarter of this year. The announcement is a major coup for Google, which is pushing into software and services, to complement its online advertising revenues. But the news will come as [...]
