DTZ says trading is in line with expectations September 17, 2009 Commercial property agent DTZ yesterday told shareholders it was trading “in line with expectations”, two months after reporting an annual pre-tax loss of £35.1m. Chairman Tim Melville-Ross yesterday said that the group’s £50m cost cutting programme had accelerating and “savings were well advanced”. Melville-Ross said: “The global economic crisis and resulting unrelenting pressure on global [...]
Blackstone poised to snap up half of BritishLand’s Broadgate complex September 17, 2009 PROPERTY investment firm British Land is poised to complete the sale of half of its £2.2bn City office complex Broadgate to US private equity house Blackstone. The two firms were last night thrashing out the terms of the deal, which will see Blackstone enter into a joint venture with British Land. Blackstone will pay just [...]
Q & A September 16, 2009 Q.WHY HAS BARCLAYS SPUN OFF THESE ASSETS?A.According to Barclays finance director Chris Lucas, the sale will reduce the bank’s exposure to potential deterioration of the assets and give it access to “stable risk-adjusted returns for shareholders over time”. Q.DOES THE SALE REDUCE THE BANK’S RISK PROFILE?A.Not really. Although the bank will be less exposed to [...]
Barclays will dump 7.5bn in risky assets September 16, 2009 BARCLAYS yesterday announced the sale of $12.3bn (£7.5bn) of credit market assets to a newly-established fund called Protium Finance, managed by former Barclays Capital (BarCap) employees, in a bid to reduce its credit market exposure. The deal, a complex piece of financial engineering, was well received by investors but slammed by some analysts and media [...]
Bankers and miners lead the way past the 5,100 mark September 16, 2009 The FTSE 100 hit its highest closing level in a year yesterday, led by banks and miners and spurred by appetite for risky assets as optimism about the pace of global economic recovery intensified. The index closed up 82 points, or 1.6 per cent higher, at 5,124.13 – the highest close since late September last [...]
Lloyds tops list of complaints against high street banks September 15, 2009 LLOYDS Banking Group has emerged as the major UK bank with the highest level of successful complaints made about it by consumers in the first half of the year, according to the Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS). FOS data reveals that 81 per cent of cases settled in the six months to 30 June involving Lloyds [...]
City warns of flaws in living wills proposal September 15, 2009 THE CITY yesterday flagged up flaws in proposals that will force banks to write “living wills” to help regulators wind them up in the event that they collapse.Chancellor Alistair Darling said yesterday that the government was planning to introduce legislation in November which would require banks to make their corporate structures more simple and provide [...]
Lehman and BarCap fight over $8.2bn September 15, 2009 TRUSTEES overseeing the liquidation of Lehman Brothers have accused Barclays Capital of taking $8.2bn (£5bn) more than it should have when it bought the failed bank’s brokerage business a year ago. In court papers filed in a US bankruptcy court yesterday, Lehman Brothers Holdings claimed “critical changes” were made to the sale in between the [...]
THE LONDON REPORT September 15, 2009 The FTSE 100 rose for a third straight session yesterday to close up by 0.5 per cent, boosted by bullish economic data from the US, as oils, miners and banks underpinned the rally. The index ended 23.28 points higher at 5,042.13, after trading as low as 4,996.52 earlier in the session. Energy stocks were higher, [...]
Lehman Bros bondholders may be owed up to 44bn September 14, 2009 THE trustee holders of collapsed Lehman Brothers’ senior bonds said the debt holders may be owed as much as $73bn (£44bn), after losing their investments when the bank filed for bankruptcy protection a year ago, according to court documents. Wilmington Trust Company claims that holders of the senior debt of the failed bank are estimated [...]