PERSONAL FINANCE NEWS August 3, 2011 INVESTORS TAKE A MEGA BITE OF APPLE Clients of Barclays Stockbrokers have named Apple their favourite technology stock. 57 per cent favoured Apple over other technology stocks, 11 per cent Google, while 10 per cent said they would be interested in investing in Facebook and Twitter if and when they float. Cisco Systems, the US [...]
Diamond calls for UK growth August 2, 2011 THE head of Barclays has called on the government to deliver a plan for growth based on a renewed faith in the private sector, warning that the economy is being strangled by a crisis in confidence. Speaking at Barclays’ half-year results, chief executive Bob Diamond said that the UK is ahead of others in tackling [...]
Barclays cuts 3,000 jobs in costs purge August 2, 2011 BARCLAYS escaped the sell-off in European banking stocks yesterday as it promised 3,000 job cuts this year and posted results showing that its investment bank has fared better than expected. The bank said it had identified £2bn in cost-savings rather than £1bn, saying that it had already laid off 1,400 workers so far in 2011, [...]
A tale of two data sets August 2, 2011 AS IF a hundred pages of figures weren’t enough, Barclays delivered two sets of headline numbers yesterday. The first, “statutory” figures, which include the impact of a £1bn PPI provision, showed half-year return on equity (RoE) falling from 9.8 per cent to 5.9 per cent. But the “adjusted” figures told the opposite story: returns are up from [...]
CITY MOVES | WHO’S SWITCHING JOBS August 2, 2011 CBRE CB Richard Ellis has appointed Adam Wilton as a senior director in its UK debt advisory division, based in London. Wilton joins from Barclays Corporate, where he was a director of the bank’s real estate structured finance business. Wilton has 12 years’ experience covering real estate finance, securitisation and principal finance. His experience includes [...]
Barclays to axe 3,000 jobs as profit falls August 2, 2011 Barclays will cut about 3,000 jobs this year as the industry grapples with tougher regulation and the impact of a spreading sovereign debt crisis on investment banking operations. First half profits at the bank fell by a third after a drop in bond trading activity at its investment bank and a charge to compensate customers [...]
LEGAL FIRM BROADENS RECRUITING HORIZONS August 1, 2011 CITY INTERNSHIPS are notoriously hard to come by. But not for regular readers of The Capitalist such as Ratidzo Chinyuku, who wrote to Taylor Wessing partner Martin Winter asking for a work placement after reading about his charity work in her homeland of Zimbabwe in this column on 12 April. Following her successful appeal, the [...]
Cooper drops takeover bid for rival Laird August 1, 2011 LAIRD shares plunged 15 per cent yesterday after Cooper Industries announced it was withdrawing its bid for the electronics components firm, saying it is unwilling to proceed at Laird’s asking price. Cooper Industries’ two-month battle to take over the smaller British rival came to a deadlock this weekend after the two companies were unable to [...]
CITY MOVES | WHO’S SWITCHING JOBS August 1, 2011 Oracle Coalfields The mining company, which is developing a 1.4bn tonne coalfield in Pakistan’s Sindh Province, has appointed Adrian Loader, the former president of Shell Canada, as chairman of the board of directors. Loader’s former board appointments include Alliance-Unichem, Alliance-Boots and Candax Energy. He is currently a director of Holcim, a member of the Garda [...]
FTSE buoyed by US debt deal August 1, 2011 The FTSE 100 tracked global markets upwards as investors were buoyed by the breaking of the deadlock over US debt. As President Obama announced that the Democrats and Republicans had finally reached an agreement over raising the country’s debt ceiling Asian markets responded positively. Investors piled back into riskier stocks and abandoned gold as the [...]