By: Samuel Norman

Senior City Reporter Samuel is a Senior City Reporter covering banking and fintech as well as stories on capital markets and economics. He also leads on City AM's morning liveblog from 7am everyday. He has previously written for the Daily Mail and The i Paper and worked for Sky News as an election stringer. He enjoys writing in-depth analysis of major blue-chip firms and start-ups and also industry trends. He can be contacted at samuel.norman@cityam.com and posts on LinkedIn and X at x.com/samnormanwrites.

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The four factors set to raise inflation this year

March 7, 2025

Inflation will briefly hit 3.6 per cent this year and “remain well above” the Bank of England’s target until late 2026, according to Oxford Economics. In a report led by UK economist Edward Allenby outlined the four key drivers of inflation in the upcoming year. Changes in the Budget Allenby highlighted the VAT slapped onto [...]
UK mortgage brokers expect interest rates to jump

March 7, 2025

According to a new study, over two-thirds of UK mortgage brokers expect interest rates to stop falling and resume their upward trend by the beginning of next year. Butterfield Mortgages surveyed 300 brokers and 69 per cent said they believed the Bank of England base rate would be higher than the current level of 4.5 per cent [...]
Royal London to share £181m of profits with customers

March 7, 2025

Royal London’s profits soared last year and it’s planning to hand some of this back to customers. Pre-tax profit at the firm grew 11 per cent to £277m, compared to £249m in 2023, after the group bolstered new businesses and consolidated its consumer book. The group announced a profit share of £181m in its annual [...]
Co-op Bank mortgage applications soar following takeover

March 7, 2025

Mortgage applications boomed at Coventry Building Society’s new subsidiary, The Co-op Bank, in its first batch of financial results since the acquisition. The bank recorded £116.2m in pre-tax profit for 2024, down from the £120.9m booked in 2023 but in line with company expectations. It said lower mortgage margins and increased savings rates weighed on net interest income, dampening [...]
Investors pulled £3bn from funds in January amidst economic uncertainty

March 6, 2025

Investors pulled £3bn out of funds amidst geopolitical and economic instability in January. This marked a sharp reverse from December, when £2.3bn had flowed into funds, according to data published by the Investment Association (IA). The research said macroeconomic conditions on the home front, namely the reacceleration of inflation, had played a part in the investment [...]
Natwest shares downgraded by analysts after recent run

March 6, 2025

Peel Hunt analysts have downgraded their rating on Natwest stock to ‘Add’ after previously telling investors to ‘Buy’. An ‘Add’ rating serves as a diluted version of the ‘Buy’ recommendation, which strongly recommends investors to purchase the stock. The analysts raised the Natwest’s target price to 510p, up from 470p, but said due to the [...]
Klarna set for US IPO in snub to London markets

March 6, 2025

Swedish fintech Klarna is looking to raise a minimum of $1bn (£777m) in a US initial public offering (IPO), sources told Bloomberg. Klarna’s US filing, which could come as soon as next week, will see the firm target a valuation of more than $15bn in the New York Stock Exchange, according to people familiar with [...]
UK construction output plummets to five-year low

March 6, 2025

The UK’s construction output hit a five-year low in February as its fastest downturn since May 2020 continued. S&P Global’s UK Construction Purchasing Managers Index dropped to 44.6 in February, down from 48.1 in January. The latest figure indicated a steep decline in overall construction activity was propelled by a sluggish performance in residential buildings, [...]
Natwest, Barclays, HSBC lead months worth of online banking outages

March 6, 2025

Nine of the UK’s biggest banks and building societies were down for over 803 hours – the equivalent of 33 days – over the last two years. Fresh data from the Treasury Committee shows a minimum of 158 IT failure incidents at banks had affected millions of consumers in the period between January 2023 and [...]
UK’s payments regulator slams Mastercard and Visa for hiking fees

March 6, 2025

The UK’s payments regulator has said the card market “isn’t working well” following a review into the fess charged by industry giants Mastercard and Visa. The Payment System Regulator (PSR) said on Thursday that the firms have raised core scheme processing fees 25 per cent since 2017, costing UK businesses an extra £170m a year. [...]

Miliband slammed for net zero sprint as high costs hamper businesses

Panmure Liberum: Netherlands will win first Fifa World Cup

The very best wine pairings for steak and fine cuts of meat

By: Samuel Norman

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