Shareholders can find a potent ally in activist funds July 15, 2012 THE so-called shareholder spring – in which shareholders have been revolting against the pay of chief executives of major corporations like Barclays, Aviva, and William Hill – is gaining momentum. And activist hedge funds, which pressure public companies to make changes to improve a company’s share price, will increasingly drive this phenomenon. Many regard hedge [...]
Diamond picks top lawyer July 12, 2012 Barclays’ embattled former chief executive Bob Diamond is being represented by top white-collar defence lawyer Andrew Levander over his role in the Libor-fiing scandal. Levander, a partner at the firm Dechert, is one of the biggest names in the defence bar in the United States. He is currently also representing former New Jersey governor Jon [...]
Banks face bill of up to $22bn in Libor scandal July 12, 2012 BANKS linked to the Libor scandal face up to $22bn (£14.3bn) in regulatory fines, legal bills and civil damages, according to the most detailed estimate so far. The total cost to banks, calculated by Morgan Stanley in what it admits is a “crude” estimate, takes into account the impact the rate-rigging scandal will have on [...]
ADVISERS GREENHILL AND OTHERS July 12, 2012 Greenhill managing director Richard Hoyle led the team advising Aegis on its £3.2bn sale to Dentsu. Hoyle has been a long-standing adviser to Aegis, having worked on the agency’s £210m purchase of Australian ad firm Mitchell Communication and last year’s sale of market researcher Synovate to Ipsos. The 36-year-old, who joined Greenhill from Credit Suisse [...]
Premier League deal extended July 12, 2012 FOOTBALL: Barclays has extended its £40m per season title sponsorship of the Premier League for a further three years, until the end of the 2015-16 season.
Barclays loses bond issue as Libor hits deals July 12, 2012 BARCLAYS yesterday lost its first major business since the Libor-fixing scandal began, as a Japanese bank pulled out of a bond issue worth around $1bn. The state-backed Japan Bank for International Cooperation had included Barclays among three banks advising on a five-year bond offering but left it out of the final offering. “Barclays was dropped [...]
Miners and banks pin back FTSE July 12, 2012 The FTSE 100 was dragged down by weak commodity stocks and banks in early trading as investors cut their exposure to riskier assets on uncertainty over whether the US Federal Reserve will launch more stimulus measures. Minutes from last month’s Fed meeting showed the world’s biggest economy would have to worsen further before the central [...]
Supporters of capitalism must help expose blundering firms July 11, 2012 CORPORATE blunders are like buses: they arrive all at once. The latest involve G4S, which doesn’t know whether it will be able to hire enough guards for the Olympics, forcing the army to step in. The O2 mobile network suffered some outages yesterday. Britvic recalled some of its drinks. All of this follows the Libor [...]
HSBC braces for $1bn US penalty July 11, 2012 BANKING giant HSBC plans to “acknowledge and apologise” for failing to spot and deal with money laundering within the bank during a US Senate panel hearing next week, according to an internal memo sent by its chief executive. “It is right that we are held accountable and that we take responsibility for fixing what went [...]
Barclays’ Del Missier to face MPs alongside regulators July 11, 2012 FORMER Barclays operations chief Jerry del Missier will appear in front of the Treasury select committee on Monday afternoon, it was announced yesterday. He quit the firm last Monday after just 11 days in the job, having taken responsibility for his role in the Libor-fixing scandal that saw his long-term colleague Bob Diamond also resign [...]