Glencore beats forecasts with £7.9bn earnings March 4, 2014 INTEGRATED miner-trader Glencore Xstrata yesterday pleased investors and analysts with consensus-busting earnings, in its first full-year results since the completion of its merger. Adjusted earnings of $13.1bn (£7.86bn) were flat but beat company-compiled estimates by seven per cent and Barclays forecasts by five per cent. Core profit from Glencore’s trading arm rose 17 per cent, [...]
Best of the Brokers for 5 March 2014 March 4, 2014 To appear in Best of the Brokers, email your research to notes@cityam.com TESCO Cantor Fitzgerald has cut the supermarket from “hold” to “sell” and slashed its target from 333p to 282p. The broker thinks rivals can easily beat Tesco’s recent price promises, meaning the firm erodes its margins in the UK to little benefit. Cantor [...]
How 4 banks are cutting quarter of a million staff March 4, 2014 The true scale of British banks’ world-dominating ambitions in the boom years and devastating collapse in the crisis is still only now becoming clear – the latest figures show the big four banks have cut 200,000 jobs since the credit crunch struck. And another 50,000 or more are set to be cut in the next [...]
Bank use of Funding for Lending surges but business loans drop March 3, 2014 USE OF the Funding for Lending Scheme by banks surged in the last part of 2013, with nearly half of the borrowings made so far coming in the year’s final quarter. Banks drew down £18.79bn in the final three months of the year, out of £41.92bn in the six quarters the scheme has been active. [...]
City Moves for 04 March 2014 | Who’s switching jobs March 3, 2014 Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer The law firm has named London-based corporate partner Martin Nelson-Jones as co-head of its infrastructure and transport sector group. He joined in 1991 and became a partner in 2001. BNY Mellon The investment management firm has announced the appointment of Frank La Salla as chief executive of its alternative investment services business. He [...]
Barclays brokers leapfrog over Citi March 2, 2014 BARCLAYS overtook rival Citigroup in the FTSE 100 broker rankings for the first time last quarter after winning a contract to be broker for catering giant Compass Group. The bank’s corporate brokers were appointed to work with the catering company last month, helping take its tally of FTSE 100 customers to 17 from 16. The [...]
Lloyds outstrips other big banks in UK’s mortgage lending boom February 27, 2014 LLOYDS is the driving force behind Britain’s mortgage boom, financing the recovery in house buying activity, the big four banks’ 2013 financial reports reveal. In stark contrast to Lloyds’ surging lending data, the other major banks cut lending or held relatively flat. Lloyds’ gross new mortgage lending came in at £36.9bn in 2013, up 40 [...]
City Moves for 28 February 2014 | Who’s switching jobs February 27, 2014 Standard Chartered The bank has announced the appointment of Sanjeeb Chaudhuri as group head of brand and chief marketing officer. He joined in 2011 from Citicorp, where he was chief executive for retail and commercial banking for Europe, the Middle East and Africa (EMEA). Chaudhuri has also held senior marketing and general management positions at [...]
Lloyds is the real driver behind the mortgage boom February 27, 2014 Britain’s housing market is booming, with mortgage lending soaring and prices rising at giddy, pre-crash rates. But not everyone is taking part – of Britain’s biggest four banks, two cut gross new mortgage lending last year, and one barely budged on the year. In fact, the boom in lending is almost all coming from Lloyds. [...]
£8.2bn loss confirms RBS’s uphill struggle February 27, 2014 As expected, RBS has reported big losses this morning, as compensation and bad loans continued to plague the lender last year. But results were even worse than expected, with a pre-tax loss of £8.2bn. Analysts had expected a loss of nearer £7bn. Deutsche Bank forecast £6.6bn. Shares have slumped nine per cent on the news, [...]