Student accomodation sector ‘very positive’ after record results day and £2bn investment August 10, 2021 The purpose-built student accommodation market has been further buoyed after record A-Level results today after investors spent £656m in the sector in the second quarter of this year. Almost half (44.8 per cent) of all A-Level grades received were either A or A*, after exams were cancelled and replaced with teacher predicted grades. There had [...]
Joe Biden’s $1 trillion infrastructure bill passes Senate August 10, 2021 President Joe Biden’s $1 trillion infrastructure bill secured enough backing to pass through the US Senate today. The passage is seen as a victory for cross-party cooperation between Democrats and Republicans. The vote fiished at 69-30 in the 100-seat chamber, with 19 Republicans voting yes. After the vote concluded, Senators stepped up efforts to push [...]
More than $600m lost in worst ever DeFi hack August 10, 2021 Poly Network, a cross-chain protocol, has been attacked by a hacker who drained $611m (£441m) in the worst ever theft affecting Decentralized Finance (DeFi). Poly Network, which operates on the Ethereum, Binance and Polygon blockchains took to Twitter to announce the theft. They said: “We are sorry to announce that #PolyNetwork was attacked on @BinanceChain, [...]
Gino D’Acampo chain rescued in £12.9m pre-pandemic bailout August 10, 2021 Celebrity chef Gino D’Acampo’s restaurant chain received a £12.9m bailout before venues were struck by Covid closures. The money was lent by D’Acampo’s co-investors and Iceland bosses, Sir Malcom Walker and Tarsem Dhaliwal, who run the linked company Individual Restaurants. Gino D’Acampo Worldwide Restaurants owes the Piccolinos owner £12.9m, including a £7.125m bank loan taken [...]
Salesforce enters streaming wars with Netflix-style business service August 10, 2021 Software giant Salesforce has waded into the increasingly crowded streaming market with the launch of a new platform offering business-focused content on demand. The San Francisco-based company said its in-house studio had produced the core programming for Salesforce Plus, which will launch at its Dreamforce event next month. The service will look to harness the [...]
Chinese social media giant Weibo’s ex-PR director arrested on bribery charge August 10, 2021 Chinese authorities have arrested today a top communications director at Chinese social media giant Weibo accused of taking bribes. Mao Taotao, former senior public relations director at Weibo, was detained by police on suspicion of accepting bribes and committing fraud. Weibo, part-owned by e-commerce giant Alibaba Groups, said the company had fired Mao and will [...]
Robinhood acquires investor relations platform Say Technologies in $140m takeover deal August 10, 2021 Fresh from its IPO at the end of last month, Robinhood today announced to its new shareholders that it will acquire online retail investor relations platform Say Technologies in a $140m (£101m) all-cash deal. New York fintech startup Say provides a digital platfrom that aims to enable retail investors to interact with the companies where [...]
Russia launches criminal probe into two allies of Kremlin critic Navalny August 10, 2021 Russian authorities have launched a criminal investigation into two top allies of Kremlin critic Alexei Navalny, for raising money for his political network – which has been labelled extremist. Allies Leonid Volkov and Ivan Zhdanov, who have already been exiled from the country, are at the centre of the investigation which was opened after a [...]
Three quarters of UK adults receive both vaccine doses August 10, 2021 Three quarters of UK adults have now been double jabbed, with an estimated 60,000 deaths prevented due to the success of the rollout. New data from Public Health England (PHE) shows COVID-19 vaccines are highly effective against hospitalisation from the Delta (B.1.617.2) variant, the dominant strain of coronavirus in the UK. The Pfizer-BioNTech vaccine is [...]
Global chip crisis boosts Arm sales amid Nvidia takeover row August 10, 2021 A global chip shortage has helped drive a surge in sales at British semiconductor giant Arm ahead of its planned $40bn (£29bn) takeover by US rival Nvidia. Cambridge-based Arm reported a 57 per cent rise in total net sales to $675m in the three months to the end of June thanks to increases in both [...]
