FTSE risers and fallers: US-China breakthrough gives markets a pre-weekend boost January 18, 2019 The FTSE soared upwards today as China signalled it would be willing to break the impasse in relations with the US. The markets reacted well to reports that the country was offering to go on a six-year buying spree to ramp up US imports to over $1tn a year. Officials made the offer, which would [...]
Brexit deal live: UK would vote to remain in EU in a second referendum January 17, 2019 Hello and welcome to our Brexit vote live blog. Stay tuned for reaction to Labour's no confidence vote yesterday, after Theresa May's Brexit deal slumped to a historic defeat in parliament on Tuesday night. Please manually refresh this page for the latest updates What you need to know: The Prime Minister’s deal was defeated by [...]
November rise in first-time buyers getting on the housing ladder January 17, 2019 First-Time buyers bolstered the UK mortgage market in November, as competitive deals and schemes such as Help to Buy boosted the number of young homeowners in the run-up to Christmas. There were 36,200 new first-time buyer mortgages completed in November, rising 5.8 per cent from the same month in the previous year, according to UK [...]
Forget Brexit – the British economy is running out of money January 17, 2019 The media circus around Brexit is currently the focus of virtually all economic commentary on the UK. This fixation is so all-consuming that we risk missing another real threat to the economy: the dramatic slowdown in the growth rate of broad money This refers to the total amount of money in the economy. There is [...]
Blackrock investigates hoax letter to chief executives over climate change January 16, 2019 Blackrock is investigating a hoax letter published this morning, claiming to be from chief executive Larry Fink, that warned companies that the world’s largest investment firm would divest unless they took action against climate change. The letter, which was posted on a spoof Blackrock website as the company reported its financial results, said the investor [...]
Bank of England in ‘regular discussion’ with Treasury over no-deal Brexit powers January 16, 2019 The Bank of England is in regular discussions with the Treasury over “no deal powers” to ensure financial stability if Britain leaves the EU on 29 March. The bank’s governor Mark Carney told the Treasury Select Committee it needed more regulatory powers by the end of March in order to protect financial firms in the [...]
UK CPI falls close to a two-year low on lower fuel and air travel prices January 16, 2019 The UK's Consumer Price Index was 2.1 per cent in December, falling to a 22-month low driven by falls in petrol prices and a year-on-year drop in air fares. Falling fuel prices contributed a 0.14 percentage points drop in the 12-month rate, as the price of petrol in December last year was the lowest since [...]
Eager for a house price fall? It’s time for a lesson in economics January 15, 2019 Would it be a good thing if house prices in the UK fell? The British public, a host of commentators on Twitter, and even some economists seem to think so. A recent YouGov poll asked Britons whether a 30 per cent fall in property values after Brexit would be a “bad thing”. Just 32 per [...]
House sales fell in 85 per cent of London boroughs in 2018 January 11, 2019 House sales slumped in 85 per cent of London boroughs in 2018 amid a difficult time for the UK’s property market, new data revealed today. London fared worse than the rest of the country in terms of the number of transactions, with a 6.5 per cent overall year-on-year drop compared to a 4.9 per cent fall [...]
The key to improving our dismal productivity? Reignite the UK’s competitive instincts January 11, 2019 The dismal productivity results out this week should cause alarm for anyone who cares about UK prosperity. And we need to talk about it. Productivity – the cumulative output of our workers per hour – is the critical indicator of how competitive we are as a nation, and the surest way of delivering sustained wage growth. [...]