OneSavings and Charter Court post higher loan books as merger draws near August 21, 2019 OneSavings Bank and Charter Court Financial have both reported higher loan books for the first half of this year as they gear up for a £1.6bn tie-up aimed at creating a leading specialist lender. Shares in both groups tumbled by roughly five per cent in morning trading, as lower net margins and Brexit-related uncertainty in [...]
Summer house deals dip amid Brexit uncertainty August 21, 2019 Britain’s property market suffered a sharp fall in the number of transactions made between June and July, as the traditional summer slowdown and growing uncertainty over Brexit dented activity. Figures released by HMRC this morning show a marked reduction in the number of property transactions over the summer months, with a drop of 8.5 per [...]
UK government spending surplus shrinks in July August 21, 2019 The UK government earned £1.3bn more in taxes than it spent in July 2019, official figures showed today, a smaller surplus than economists had expected. Read more: Chancellor Javid to simplify’ the tax system in Autumn budget Analysts predicted a £2.7bn surplus in public borrowing in the first figures under new chancellor Sajid Javid, but [...]
Softbank-backed startup Uhuru to list in London August 21, 2019 Japanese software startup Uhuru is to go public in London later this year, after opening an office in the city in 2018. The company raised $4.5m from Softbank last year, and also counts Salesforce, Dentsu and Mitsui & Co as investors. Uhuru, an IoT startup which helps connect products to the cloud, said it will [...]
Boris in Berlin: PM seeks to woo Merkel after Tusk turns down backstop plea August 21, 2019 Boris Johnson is travelling to Berlin today for his first bilateral meeting with German Chancellor Angela Merkel since taking office, in the hope of breaking the Brexit impasse. The UK Prime Minister will have meet his German counterpart this afternoon, followed by dinner, before travelling to Paris for talks with French President Emmanuel Macron on [...]
Business groups hail ‘long overdue’ move on customs system August 21, 2019 Businesses are to be automatically enrolled in a new customs system, as part of government efforts to keep British firms trading after Brexit. HMRC will allocate more than 88,000 firms with an Economic Operator Registration and Identification (EORI) number in the next fortnight – double the existing number. Letters informing companies of their EORI number [...]
Going to party like it’s 1919: Time to celebrate the centenary of some of the UK’s most important companies August 21, 2019 This coming Sunday marks the centenary of an important anniversary. On 25 August 1919, the world’s first daily international scheduled flight took place. There was only one passenger on board the flight between London and Paris, along with cargo which included newspapers, Devonshire cream, jam, and grouse. The carrier was Aircraft Transport and Travel Limited, [...]
The Brexit hysteria is misplaced – humans have always adapted and moved forwards August 21, 2019 There is a profound oddity about the whole of the Brexit process which rears its ugly head on a continual basis – namely the desire of certain commentators and politicians to talk down every development in this long-running national saga as being inevitably likely to lead to national ruin. And not just any common or [...]
Stamp duty contortions and eco-warriors with private jets? Welcome to silly season August 21, 2019 August is traditionally the silly season. Brexit makes this year slightly different, of course, but it is good to see a fine British tradition still being preserved. Silly stories abound. Sajid Javid was linked (erroneously, he now claims) with the idea of fixing the housing market by making sellers pay the stamp duty rather than the [...]
UK officials ‘unshackled’ from EU meetings ahead of Brexit August 20, 2019 The government has told UK officials and ministers to stop attending “most” European Union meetings from the start of next month. The move, which will come into effect from 1 September, is billed as enabling officials to “focus on our future relationship with the EU and other partners around the world”. From that point on, [...]