Qualcomm to buy Atheros in $3.1bn deal January 5, 2011 QUALCOMM plans to buy Atheros Communications for roughly $3.2bn (£2.1bn) in cash, showing its determination to become a major player in supplying chips for smartphones and tablet computers. Qualcomm is clearly betting that the deal – at a 21.6 per cent premium to Atheros’ share price before talk of the takeover began to circulate – [...]
The UK’s largest housebuilder says the road to recovery will be long December 19, 2010 PERSIMMON chief executive Mike Farley is not looking for a magic bullet. The boss of the country’s largest housebuilder is clear that the sector has endured its worst slump since World War Two and faces at least a two-year road to recovery. The industry tends to listen when Farley speaks. Not just because he runs [...]
City warns over rights issue rip off December 13, 2010 INVESTMENT banks have been slammed by the City’s top institutional investors for charging unfairly high fees to companies raising capital through rights issues. An inquiry commissioned by the Institutional Investor Council, backed by the Association of British Insurers and the National Association of Pension Funds, lashes out at investment banks today for charging underwriting fees [...]
WHAT THE OTHER PAPERS SAY THIS MORNING December 12, 2010 FINANCIAL TIMES CREDIT SUISSE TO ISSUE COCOS EARLY Credit Suisse’s chief executive said he hoped to begin issuing billions of dollars in contingent-capital bonds in the next year to help shore up the bank’s financial strength well ahead of new Swiss regulations. Brady Dougan also defended Credit Suisse’s decision to award one-off payments to about [...]
PROPERTY NEWS December 9, 2010 DEMAND FOR PROPERTY AT QUARTER’S HIGH Demand for property is on the rise for the first time in four months, according to the National Association of Estate Agents. House-hunters increased in November, attracted to falling prices, while supply remains static. Close to Christmas, there are usually fewer sales to avoid family disruption; people also tend [...]
Builder of the Gherkin to move into house market December 9, 2010 NORDIC building firm Skanska launched a UK housebuilding arm yesterday in an effort to cash in on what it sees as a gap in supply. The builder of the Gherkin and Heron Tower skyscrapers said it hopes to sell 800 homes a year by 2015. “The financial crisis and the dramatic decline in the housing [...]
Home-builders ramp up incentives to lure hard-up first-time buyers December 2, 2010 HOME-BUILDERS have always offered buyers deals, but some are more valuable than others. Take, for example, the West Bromwich Building Society’s offer in 2004 of a free Rover car worth over £7,000 – a year before the car-maker went into administration. The downturn has left house-builders with new-builds sitting empty all over the country, and [...]
PROPERTY NEWS November 18, 2010 RENTS ON THE RISE Rents rose for the ninth consecutive month in October to £691 while tenant arrears fell significantly for the second month in a row, according to the latest buy-to-let index from LSL Property Services. Unpaid rent totalled £221m, down from £229.3m in the previous month. This accounted for just 9.3 per cent [...]
Gloom hinders Barratt sales November 17, 2010 BUILDER Barratt Developments yesterday reported an autumn slowdown in reservations, as an uncertain economic environment and limited mortgage availability continued to weigh on consumer sentiment. Net reservations per active sales site stood at 0.45 compared with 0.55 a year ago as homebuyers took longer to commit to buying ahead of a government announcement on spending [...]
Barratt sees sales slow in tough market November 17, 2010 Barratt Developments has reported an autumn slowdown in house reservations as economic uncertainty continues to weigh on buyers. Net private reservations per active site stood at 0.45 compared with 0.55 in the period a year ago, as buyers took longer to commit. The company said last month’s spending review had drained some confidence from the [...]