US President Donald Trump’s trade war with China is following a familiar path February 13, 2019 It has been nearly a year since Donald Trump infamously tweeted that “trade wars are good, and easy to win,” adding, for extra emphasis, “it’s easy!” How things change. America’s most enthusiastically protectionist modern-day President isn’t finding talks with China so simple after all. This week he rowed back on a supposedly-hard deadline that was [...]
Inflation drops to two-year low of 1.8 per cent as electricity and fuel prices fall February 13, 2019 The UK inflation rate fell to a two-year low of 1.8 per cent in January as electricity and gas prices continued to drop. The Consumer Price Index dropped from 2.1 per cent in December, falling below the Bank of England’s two per cent target for the first time since 2017. Read more: German inflation stalls [...]
Packaging company Smurfit Kappa posts loss after Venezuelan arm seized by Maduro government February 13, 2019 Packaging company Smurfit Kappa posted heavy losses after its Venezuelan business was seized by President Nicolas Maduro’s regime but boosted profits elsewhere. The company reported pre-tax losses of €404m in 2018 compared with a profit of €576m the previous year – it said the deconsolidation cost €1.3bn but it was seeking compensation for the government’s [...]
Venezuela’s Nicolas Maduro calls for gold held in Bank of England to be returned February 12, 2019 Venezuela’s embattled President Nicolas Maduro said yesterday that the Bank of England should repatriate the Venezuelan gold it holds in its vaults. “They have sequestered billions of dollars in gold in London that are ours – that is money to buy supplies, raw materials, food, medicines. They have sequestered $1.4bn [£1.09bn] for many months, that we [...]
Carney: Brexit could be the ‘acid test’ for a new global order and agreement must be reached February 12, 2019 Britain’s departure from the EU could be the “acid test” for a new global order, Mark Carney said today as he urged politicians to find a Brexit solution in the coming weeks. The Bank of England governor said Brexit had global implications and its outcome could determine whether international cooperation could exist alongside rising protectionism. [...]
Wisdom of crowds: startup brings crowd funding to litigation finance February 11, 2019 When Cormac Leech, chief executive of new crowd funding litigation platform Axiafunder, is questioned about the potential 20-30 per cent returns offered to investors on its website, he doubles down. “If anything I’d say its conservatively 20-30 per cent, we would aspire to do better than that actually,” he says. Any investment offering such stellar [...]
Busting the millennial myth February 11, 2019 Last month I was invited to present at a conference in Berlin; I spent a couple of days preparing and got up at 4am to fly over. The speaker before me confidently told the audience that millennials lacked their elders’ work ethic so would drag down productivity and GDP growth. As I took to the [...]
HSBC chair Mark Tucker set to head up influential City lobbyists TheCityUK February 11, 2019 The chairman of HSBC Holdings has emerged as the frontrunner to head the board at one of the City’s main lobby groups replacing fellow banker John McFarlane. Mark Tucker is set to be announced for the role at TheCityUK in the coming days as outgoing Barclays chairman McFarlane steps down in the spring, Sky News [...]
Metro Bank investors mull legal action over accounting error February 10, 2019 Metro Bank is facing a potential looming court action after an accounting error that was detected by the Bank of England caused its shares to plummet. The Sunday Telegraph reported that commercial litigation specialists Stewarts Law had been approached by a number of investors to look into the matter. Stewarts Law partner Clive Zeitman told the newspaper: [...]
Going for gold: How the Bank of England became a battleground of the Venezuela crisis February 10, 2019 While tens of thousands of Venezuelans continued their revolt against the regime of discredited strongman Nicolas Maduro last week, a rather different form of protest popped up in the Square Mile. A group of far-left protesters, who counted Ken Livingstone and Labour MP Chris Williamson among their ranks, accused the Bank of England of “theft” [...]