Wal-Mart in case setback April 26, 2010 ASDA owner Wal-Mart suffered a blow yesterday when a US court ruled a sex-discrimination lawsuit against the retailer can proceed as a class-action case covering more than one million female employees. Wal-Mart , the world’s largest retailer, had asked the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals in San Francisco to undo class-action certification in what could [...]
Tobacco ‘price fixers’ hit with £225m fine April 16, 2010 BRITAIN’S largest two tobacco manufacturers and ten retail groups have been fined a total of £225m by the Office of Fair Trading (OFT). Imperial Tobacco and Gallaher as well as the stores – including Asda and the Co-op – were hit with fines after a seven-year investigation into price fixing. The tobacco companies agreed to [...]
WHAT THE OTHER PAPERS SAY THIS MORNING April 15, 2010 FINANCIAL TIMES INVESTORS RAISE FEARS ON “STEWARDSHIP CODE” As the Financial Reporting Council prepares to issue a shareholders’ best practice code, industry groups and institutional investors say they are worried it will become another list of boxes to tick. The FRC’s consultation on the world’s first official “stewardship code” closes on Friday and it expects [...]
Asda chief to step down as takeover rumours sweep City April 12, 2010 ANDY Bond is stepping down as chief executive of Asda in a shock move ahead of his unveiling of the company’s five-year strategy plan. Bond is stepping into a new role of chairman on the board of Asda – a subsidiary of US retail giant Walmart – the firm said yesterday. The role will start [...]
Banks and energy companies push the FTSE slightly higher but miners struggle April 12, 2010 Gains from banks and energy stocks outweighed weaker miners to leave Britain’s top share index slightly higher by the close yesterday, as anxiety about debt-plagued Greece eased, supporting risk appetite. The FTSE 100 ended the day 6.67 points higher at 5,777.65, slipping back after hitting an intra-day peak since June 2008 of 5,803.71 early in [...]
Asda chief Bond to step down April 12, 2010 ANDY Bond is stepping down as chief executive of Asda in a shock move ahead of his unveiling of the company’s five-year plan. Bond is stepping into a new role of chairman on the board of Asda – a subsidiary of US-giant Walmart – the company said yesterday. The role will start off full-time to [...]
Asda moves to beat tax rate April 11, 2010 Asda, the second largest supermarket chain in the UK, helped a number of senior executives dodge the new 50 per cent top rate of income tax by paying them a portion of their annual salary upfront in March. Asda would not confirm how many staff earning above £150,000 per year took up the opportunity. Meanwhile, [...]
Sainsbury’s sales hit by slowing growth March 24, 2010 SAINSBURY’S has reported its smallest rise in underlying quarterly sales in almost five years. Britain’s third biggest grocery chain said stores open at least one year rose 1.7 per cent, excluding fuel, in the fourth quarter. That was down from 3.7 per cent in its third quarter and the smallest rise since the first quarter [...]
Record low for food inflation March 2, 2010 FOOD PRICES are increasing at their slowest annual rate in three years thanks to the falling cost of fresh food according to the British Retail Consortium’s (BRC)-Nielsen shop price index published today. Food prices were just 1.3 per cent higher on a year earlier in February compared to an annual increase of 2.9 per cent [...]
February sees bumper sales on high street February 25, 2010 BRITISH consumers returned to the high street in their droves in the first half of February, after January’s cold snap kept them at home. The Confederation for British Industry (CBI) said that in early February retailers had seen the strongest annual growth in sales volumes since May 2007. Almost half of all firms surveyed (46 [...]