Banks take a bashing July 30, 2013 ■ Barclays forced to fix £12.8bn gap ■ JP Morgan pays $410m settlement ■ Billions more set aside for PPI ■ Deutsche Bank cuts balance sheet ■ RBS investors file £4bn claims BILLIONS of pounds were wiped off banks’ stock market values yesterday as a barrage of regulatory and legal action shocked markets. Barclays [...]
Bankers as trapeze artists, central planners and markets July 30, 2013 THERE are three ways we can organise banking. The first, which I don’t recommend, is to adopt the pre-2008 model; the second is the current approach, which seeks to micro-manage everything and which will also fail; and the third would be to allow genuine market discipline to be reinstated. Under the first approach, there [...]
Investors rally round Barclays’ boss July 30, 2013 INVESTORS and analysts hit out at regulators yesterday, accusing the Bank of England of making arbitrary and unreasonable demands on banks. Barclays had pleased investors in February with a plan to cut its least efficient units and get back on a sustainable footing with return on equity (RoE) above its cost of capital in [...]
Bottom Line: Antony Jenkins’ plans are being undermined for no good reason July 30, 2013 Antony Jenkins must wonder if it is really worth all the effort – despite everything he has done to rehabilitate Barclays’ image after last year’s disasters, the authorities have still found ways to keep investors worried. The chief took over after the former chairman, chief executive and chief operating officer all quit in the [...]
Bank to fight watchdog’s Qatari claims July 30, 2013 BARCLAYS yesterday vowed to fight the Financial Conduct Authority’s findings after the City watchdog investigated claims of wrongdoing in the bank’s 2008 fundraising round. The bank’s announcement comes as the Treasury is considering giving another £2m to the Serious Fraud Office to further investigate the case. The lender raised £5.3bn from the Middle Eastern [...]
Win Boris’s signed cycle shirt July 30, 2013 THERE are only four days to go until Mayor of London Boris Johnson captains his very own Team Boris in the Ride London 100 race – a 100 mile cycle challenge around London and Surrey. Cycling on the Mayor’s team are City pedallers from the likes of Cazenove Capital, Barclays, Aviva, and Azure Wealth. And [...]
London Report: FTSE shrugs off Barclays rights issue to tick up July 30, 2013 UPBEAT earnings from leading companies nudged Britain’s benchmark equity index higher yesterday, enabling the market to offset a slump in Barclays after the bank announced plans for a $9bn capital hike. The blue-chip FTSE 100 index closed up 0.2 per cent, or 10.70 points, at 6,570.95. Engineer GKN topped the leaderboard with a 6.5 per [...]
Investor attacks regulator for being “hostile to banks” July 30, 2013 The head of equities at Barclays' fifth largest shareholder has slammed the UK's financial regulator for being "capricious and hostile to banks". David Cumming, head of equities at Standard Life Investments, has told Reuters that regulators are responsible for a "lack of stability or consistency" in capital requirements. From a taxpayer and investors viewpoint this [...]
JP Morgan agrees $410m settlement over energy market manipulation allegations July 30, 2013 JP Morgan Ventures Energy Corporation has agreed with the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) to pay ratepayers the sum of $410m (£268m) to settle a US energy probe (release). JP Morgan neither admits or denies the allegations, which involve market manipulation from the company’s bidding activities in electricity markets in California and the Midwest from [...]
Initial reactions to Barclays results and capital shortfall plan July 30, 2013 Source: Yahoo Following the drop in Barclays's share price after it announced a drop in profits and plans to fill a bigger-than-expected £12.8bn capital hole, analysts have been mulling what this means for the bank. Mark Kimsey, a senior trader at Accendo Markets, says investors are getting fed up with Barclays and moving into state-owned [...]